Tales of the Surf, the Sword, and the Pearl
by xxskyWriterxx
Summary: The chronicles of Captain Jack Sparrow. Legends arise from the most unlikely of places.
1. Prologue

_Prologue _

There are many great stories in the world, and many of them tell of the endeavors of all sorts of great men. Ah, these men did all sorts of crazy little things; they scaled snowy peaks, they sailed thrice around the bloody globe without killing themselves, and they slew blasted beasts and lived to tell the tale. And the world rose around them, glorified them. Made them as immortal as the cursed gods themselves. It was with this movement, by the people, that the stories were lost. 'Warped' is maybe a better word. Say a man got lucky, on one day when there was an unruly mountain goat charging through his village and causing trouble. So he threw his little spear like a blind man, and heaven and behold, he struck the bloody beast! And perhaps got a little scratched up in the process. But when his kinsmen rose about him, cherishing his 'heroism' (shall we call it), the true story of a plain man who got his lucky shot just about vanished. In the eyes of the world, he became a muscled, brave old prince type who strode up and severed a great dragon, just with the pure beauty of his gaze! Or perhaps he became a man who rescued swooning wenches from high, tower keeps. Or maybe he became a man who escaped from a desert island by way of some blasted sea turtles! Being a legend is some damn right hard work, and I daresay I've nearly had enough. I've seen too many old friends, I suppose. Well, the life of pirate is never all that easy….not that I should ever expect it to be. It's no magnificent little garden party, being (Captain!) Jack Sparrow, brilliant and wily and all that jazz. It's never been easy. Not since the day when my charming mum and dad met at a tavern in good old Tortuga, not since the day when I was born aboard the _Silver Crest_, not since the day when I stopped looking my old dad square in the eye. Perhaps I'm exaggerating a wee bit when I say that always, whenever I look behind my blasted shoulder, there's some buffoon who's running aft, thirsting for my blood. One should never trust these old friends, you know, because you never know when they might….turn on you. Now that's one thing I wish it hadn't taken old Jack so blasted long to learn.


	2. My Dad's Woman

_Dad's Woman_

I stand on the deck, shivering in my boots. They are soaked all the way through, and my feet slosh around as I trod over the slippery, wooden planks. My toes are like ice, and the wind rips through my hair, biting my grimy skin. Sniffing, I tuck my bruised fingers into my long sleeves and dash away, heading for the galley below deck, where Mum is singing and cooking up dinner for the crew. What I won't give, just to get out of this evil, biting cold. I run smack into somebody's thighs, and I wince, gazing up painfully, squinting at the blinding white sunlight.

"Watch where yer running, little fool!" he barks at me, his spittle spraying my face. I nod quickly, clutching my arms to my chest as another gust of wind swirls through my hair and my clothes.

"I'm sorry, Mr. Tanner; I wasn't watching."

"Aye; so I've gathered. Just go off and don't bother me no more; old Tanner's got a hell of a lot of swabbin' to do, after that bloody squall last night. I wonder where the thing's gone off to- I was certain that we'd be swimmin' in Davy Jones' locker by now."

He looks out over the distant horizon, where the shimmery blue of the sea fades into the azure wash of the sky. It is a cloudless day, and the sun is bright. The fierce wind whips and whispers in the sails of the _Silver Crest_, and I hear the lines groaning and the pulleys and the boards creaking. Men's rough voices float on the breeze and I shiver again, sidestepping out of Tanner's chilling shadow. He smiles down at me, leaning drunkenly on the rickety handle of his mop as the waves roll up and down beneath us, cradling us.

"Aye, well we was pretty lucky last night I reckon, little Mr. Sparrow. Lucky we live to see another one of these shiny days. Just look at that big blue, winking at us out there."

Tanner sighs, and the wind carries the warm stench of his rotten breath. I wrinkle my nose, brushing a few stray hairs from my forehead; I know that I'll never let _my _breath smell that awful. Tanner and I stand in heavy silence, the salty splash of the waves and the groaning song of the _Crest_ filling the void.

"May I, um; can I go see my mum, now, Mr. Tanner?" I ask timidly, sliding my eyes away. "I'm getting a bit cold up here and…"

"Ah, don't mind me, Little Sparrow; Old Tanner was just playin' with ye. Go, and mind yerself, lad. Don't go slippin' on that old deck; that's what happened to yer old friend Smith, there."

The plump, balding pirate gestures to the thin, spindly man sitting on the starboard railing, staring out over the water with an empty expression on his scarred, bony face. My stomach gives a hard wrench as my gaze falls upon Smith's missing right hand; all he has left is a little useless stub, poking out of the end of his sleeve like a broken mast.

"Stabbed his hand when he fell, the poor bloke. Had to cut it off or he'd die of the bad spirits in his wound. So best mind yer step, Little Sparrow."

Tanner grins, giving me a little shove. I stumble, falling to my knees; I quickly scramble back upright, terror popping in my head and the wind's breath chilling my damp legs. Tanner laughs, a great, booming sound; his sea-blue eyes are twinkling like the glossy waves in a sunlit harbor. But I don't see anything funny, and I walk away, as quickly as possible but still carefully, until I hear a familiar voice.

"Avast, mate; stop that squabbling of yers and get back to work! The _Crest_ won't repair herself, and who knows what squalls will be a'comin' this way, what; after that devil we met last night!"

My father. His voice was deep; any deeper and he could be a whale, clicking and groaning and drifting silently like a monster under the dark water. His voice sounds sure and strong, and anything he said we all obeyed. This was good, because my dad is the captain of the _Crest_. My own dad. He tells me all the time about how nice it is to be captain, and if I want to be a good pirate, I'll have to be a captain too.

"Aye" I always tell him. "Aye, I will be a captain!"

After that, my dad always laughs; his laugh is even more booming than Tanner's, and I can always feel the sound shaking in my skin. Maybe he thinks I sound a bit funny. His crew thinks I'm funny too.

Silently, I inch up around the base of the main-mast, my gaze fixed on my father, standing out at the rail, his back to me. He is tall, so tall that his head scrapes the clouds and his shadow always covers me, chilling me. He wears a bandanna tied over the top of his head, and over that he has a big hat, a captain's hat with a big, white feather that blows like steam in the wind as he stares out over the rolling sea, leaning softly against the railing and rubbing the wood gently beneath his fingers. His coarse, black-brown hair is like mine (except much longer), and it flutters as the wind whisks through it. He doesn't seem to notice; his fingertips caress the knotted wood of the _Crest_'s port railing, like he is petting a pet cat or stroking a lady's hair. That's what the _Crest_ is; my dad has told me himself.

"The _Silver Crest_ is my woman," he said. "And I will always treat her like one."

I tear my gaze away from my father's proud stance, my fingers clutching the edge of the mast and my sights sliding over the grubby, sludgy deck of the ship, worn and battered from years of pirate boots and the wind and the waves. She doesn't seem much like a woman to me.


	3. Mr Smith

_Mr. Smith_

Days have passed, and no more squalls have come. I walk the decks with my mother's blanket wrapped about my shoulders, taking my rest after the toil of black night of the squall.

"Seems that mighty Calypso has blessed us with her mercy, Little Sparrow," says Tanner, snorting at his own joke. "After all, we's all still alive and kickin' and no more nasty winds are in sights!"

"But I thought that the Court of the Brethren…"

"Aye, Little Sparrow, Aye!" he says, chuckling and sloshing his mop in his bucket, spilling the soiled water. "Have ye no sense of humor, lad? See here, boy, lighten up or ye might turn up like Smith, there."

He jabs a dirty finger at Mr. Smith, who is on his knees, polishing the rim of one of the _Crest_'s deck-positioned cannons, humming quietly to himself. I begin to wonder why Tanner bothers.

"If there's one thing in this world that I've never seen, it's the smile of old Smithy. Don't know what's plaguing the feller; why, it's a fine day! The sun's smilin' down, there's not a blasted cloud in the sky, and wind's enough to keep us movin'; I reckon we'll reach port in a matter of days, at this here pace!"

"Yes; my father's very excited about it."

"Well, now that's a good thing to hear; poor old Captain Sparrow hasn't seen much action lately, and I reckon he's feelin' a bit run down. Heard that Marlena's been runnin' him out on a limb as well."

"Mum?"

Tanner nods, his smile showing his rotted, crooked teeth.

"Yer mother's a special one, Little Sparrow."

"I know."

We stare out over the water, at the green-brown smudge at the edge of the horizon that means land. Land. I hadn't been on land for what seemed like a whole lifetime, and I can't hardly wait. ***

When night's dark fingers creep over the edge of the sky, I go to stand on deck in the golden glow of the lanterns, staring up at the stars popping and sparkling like jewels scattered across the inky black heavens. If they could be gathered and strung into a necklace, what a fine necklace it would be.

I feel a sudden touch on my shoulder and I spin around, panic suddenly flooding my mind and my breath seizing at my lungs; I aim a sharp kick at the knees of the man behind me and he grunts at the impact, shuddering and crumpling to the deck. Panting, my face flushing with heat, my desperate hands draw my little dagger from my belt and hold it up in front of me, my eyes flashing menacingly and the blade glimmering in the dark. My lip is curled and my fingers are shaking; leaning back against the rail and clutching my dagger in my hands, I glower down at the man fallen in front of me; his face is turned downward, so I can't see it. Groaning, the man pushes himself upright, piercing me with his slate grey eyes, like the blinding mist in the morning. It is Mr. Smith. A gasp escapes my lips as I recall the horror of his missing hand; there is a sudden flurry of movement and my dagger is sent clattering and spinning upon the deck, the blade shining feebly in the flickering lantern-light. The _Crest_ groans beneath me and my mouth drops open for a scream, only to be quickly clamped by Smith's rough, gritty hand.

"Now, hold on there, lad; I didn't mean to frighten you," Smith says; his voice is calm and soothing, like the steady wash of waves on a shore. "My my; the boys weren't kidding when they said the captain's son was a sharp one, now were they? What be your name, son?"

His hand slips from my mouth, and he seats himself comfortably on the deck in front of me, gazing gently with his crystal grey eyes. My lips tremble for a second, lost for words. My father constantly reminds me not to talk to or confide in others.

"I'm Jack." I finally reply, my voice as soft as the sand's whisper.

"Aye, that's it: Jack Sparrow," Smith answers; I feel my body relax as his eyes release me from their hold, the fingers of his single hand closing on the handle of my dagger, lifting it up from the ground and studying it. The silvery blade flickers in the lamp-light, the metal's swarthy, patched golden reflections playing across our faces. "And how old may you be, Jack?"

I swallow. I know that I should not tell him anything, that I should grab my dagger and turn away. That I should abandon Mr. Smith. But with one look from his eyes, I am frozen, and I cannot look away. What a man he is.

"I've seen about eight years." I reply, my voice wavering like the flickering lamp-light. "That's what my father told me."

"You are quite well spoken for eight years."

After turning the blade over once more, Smith replaces my dagger back into my grip, its flash shining in his eyes. "And you are quite well-trained in sword fighting techniques. Very, very impressive."

"My father teaches me, sir. It is an honor."

"My my, and what a gentleman you are, Mr. Sparrow. Has your father taught this to you as well?"

I stare down at my feet, suddenly unable to speak; I slide my dagger back into its sheath with a sound of gently grating steel. I look back down at him, and find that his gaze has not faltered. I feel my knees shaking.

"Well, lad, charming as you may be, I have no reasons for you to call me 'sir'; I do not find myself worthy of such a title."

"I….Well…." Silence clutches and twists my delicate words within its crushing grasp. "Who _are _you?"

"Call me Smith, please. Or you can use 'Mr. Smith' or even 'Smithy' if you like; I don't mind one way or another."

"Why are you doing this, Mr. Smith?"

He suddenly smiles, like daybreak, and I cannot utter another single word.

"Do you see those stars up there, Jack?" Smith suddenly asks, jabbing his finger upward into the swirling darkness. Speechless, my eyes follow his fingers and I spot them; their silvery glow piercing the night like the diamonds on Mum's favorite brooch. "Together, those little lights become a picture, a constellation. I've heard stories about this one; some folks call it 'the Great Bear'. Supposedly, a long, long time ago, three hunters chased after a bear that was terrorizing their village. The hunters followed and followed and followed, determined to kill the beast, and when the bear leapt off of the earth and into the heavens, the hunters followed. And that is them, up there in the sky; the three hunters and the great bear. Do you see them?"

I see, and I cannot stop staring. Smiling, Mr. Smith rises and walks away. And I wish with all my heart to follow him.


	4. Beads

_Beads_

"Oh, Jackie; what has that lunatic of a man been making you do? Good gospel; your hair is an absolute disgrace! No son of mine, oh, no son of mine…"

I sit on Mum's soft, velvet stool, staring into the fuzzy, flickering candlelight, their strong perfume and the soothing heat slowly relaxing my eyelids. Mum sits on her sofa behind me, gripping a golden-plated brush in her graceful, slender fingers and running it viciously through my matted mess of shoulder-length, dark brown hair, snarled and tangled from the rain and the wind of the sea. This is Mum's den; piled and cluttered with heaps of things, from fist-sized rubies to shimmering, iridescent peacock feathers that stand taller than she. The candlelight bathes the room in a warm, rosy glow, and the shadows lurk and drift seductively in the corners, in sync with the rolling motion of the_ Crest_ on the waves.

I wince as Mum's brush catches a tangle, crying out and gripping a lock of hair in my fingers.

"Ouch; Mum, don't pull my hair!"

"Hush, Jackie, hush; I am just fixing it up for you! Both you and your father have such beautiful hair, and I simply cannot see it go to waste!"

"So I still can't cut it short, like all the other boys?"

"No, son, no; I will not hear of it! It is a long-upheld tradition of the Sparrow family to proudly sport long, elaborate hair styles, child, and you will not be the boy to break this custom!"

I snort, tossing my shoulders and blowing a stray hair from my forehead.

"Pirates don't have long hair, Mum; they need it short for…well, for doing important things, like battling, and-"

"Oh, Jackie, please hush. Now hold still while I bring my beads over…"

I hear her sofa creak as she rises and strides across her den, rummaging through her stacks. My mouth drops open; I cannot believe it.

"Mum, I don't want _beads_! The crew already laughs at me for my long hair, now they'll say I look like…"

"What, dear?"

I sniff, my eyes prickling with tears and my shoulders shaking.

"…like a girl!" I cry, hot tears spilling down my cheeks as the burning rage and humiliation bursts forth. Mum turns back to face me, momentarily stunned into silence. I take advantage of her surprise, whacking the tin of beads from her hands and scattering them across the carpet like pattering raindrops. Mum's cry is drowned out by my own tears as I leap off of the stool and land heavily on the carpet, tearing my way towards the door. In the split second that my fingers fumble on the doorknob, Mum seizes a lock of my thick hair and yanks me backwards, pain exploding across my scalp in stinging waves. My screams split the air and Mum smothers me in her arms; I kick and struggle to worm my way free, but she is much too big to beat. Her hair jabs my cheek, and I continue to sob, my skin sticky with salt and my body exhausted from fighting; Mum's soft fingers grasp my chin and tilt my face up towards her own, her chestnut eyes glimmering in the low light.

"Jackie…"she murmurs softly, stroking my hair and holding me close to her, warming me. "Calm down, my little baby, just calm down. This isn't for me, sweetie, and it isn't for you. It is for your family, for the Sparrows, and for your father. Please, darling, please listen to me."

My tears are all but gone, and my sparkling eyes are fixed on the little red bead that she holds in her hand.

"Soon, my son, you will be nine years of age; my goodness, I cannot believe how fast you are growing, Jack, growing into a fine young man. And this is part of becoming that man, son."

I think of my father, how he holds his chin so high and how his shadow darkens all who stand by him, like a god. I think of him, and I submit. When I emerge from the den, my hair is braided into many small braids, the two strands framing my face are strung with beads of red and white and black and brown and green and gold, like little necklaces that bounce with every step. I wear a little red bandanna, in the same style as my father, and my dark eyes are emphasized by a thick stroke of dark, black eye makeup. Eyeliner, says Mum. I've never looked so silly, and I've never felt so proud. I walk lightly across the deck, fighting to keep my expression flat under the crew's stares. The sea breeze flowing around me, I come to stand by my father, who is again stroking the port railing of his 'woman'. He barely gives me a sideways glance.


	5. Cannonballs

_Cannonballs_

The hot afternoon sun burning on my back, I scramble up the rigging of the _Crest_, seizing the thick ropes in my hands and pulling myself up higher and higher, ascending up into the pure, clear shades of the sapphire sky. The sea opens out beneath me, gently rocking the _Crest _like a baby's cradle. The warmth of the golden light soaks into my skin, and the wind sweeps through my braided hair, the new beads thumping against my head and glittering in the sun. I close my eyes and open my ears, the whispers of the wind, the creak of the wood, and the roar of the waves spilling into me like liquid. Within this song, I hear others speaking below me, their soft, secretive voices carried along in the salty air by the soft, whipping breeze.

"Aye, I heard of it too; the Sparrow boy does not carry a sword. What is the captain thinking, training that child without a proper pirate's weapon?"

"That is just my point, Lakes; I don't think that the captain's training the child."

My heart nearly thudded to a stop, and my hands slipped a bit on the ropes of the rigging.

"Here, now, is that so? How could he possibly-"

"Oh, the captain decided on it a bit ago; after we left Emerald Cove, after that run in with the redcoats…"

"Aye, I remember that….Truly awful; just about tore the _Crest_ to pieces with their big guns…

"Those Brits have mighty fine weaponry, and they put up a hell of a fight when they have the will…Captain Sparrow was devastated, he was. Told me right then and there that he would not train his little son; feared he couldn't do it, and the Sparrows would be further shamed if young Jack went down the same path as old Joseph."

"Not ever had a good one in the family then, I suppose?"

"Not much. Failures the lot of them. I only remain loyal to Sparrow because of our families' old friendship; practically everyone else has left him. At first they thought maybe Joseph was special, that maybe he had the qualities of the pirate captain they were looking for."

"I suppose that they were wrong, weren't they?"

Silence. A small sigh drifts among the waves.

"Jack is all that captain Sparrow has left, and yet he does not dare."

I feel the wet trickle against my cheeks before I realize that I am crying.


	6. The Man with the Bloodied Eyes

_The Man with the Bloodied Eyes_

"FIRE!"

My father's booming command bursts across the air, and it seems to split it into pieces, like a shattered mirror. Wiping the sweat off of my brow, I grip the tiny, flickering fire and light the fuse, pressing my hands to my ears as the cannon fires in a cloud of smoky gunpowder, its earth-trembling, rumbling cry tearing across the sky. Peering out from inside the dark bowels of the _Crest_, my eyes lock onto the cannonball as it streams in a fuzzy black arc, slicing the blue of the sky like a gleaming dagger and then slamming into the side of the of oncoming British vessel, the _St. Mary_, a few boards on her bow flying loose and splashing down into the murky harbor waters of the port. My stomach rises in a single, bubbly, excited moment that is quickly extinguished as steel-strong fingers clasp onto my collar and yank me backwards, tearing me away from the cannons. I stumble blindly, fumbling at the grip on my collar when suddenly it is released; I crumple into a heap on the sticky floor, my face blackened with gunpowder and shining with sweat.

"Jack, what on god's green earth are you doing, foolish child? Have I not instructed you to keep away from the big guns? For doubloons a plenty, a cannonball could easily take off the head of an inexperienced boy!"

I keep my expression flat, pulling myself to my feet and straightening my collar.

"Well, it's a good thing I'm not inexperienced, then, daddy," I say, turning and taking a step back towards the cannons, only to be stopped by my father's hand closing on my shoulder and whipping me around, his eyes sticking into me like knives.

"Leave the cannons to the crew, Jack; you're but a boy, and I don't want to lose ye to a stray cannonball."

I purse my lips but I follow his orders, turning and walking back up the dark stair and into the light streaming down in bright cascades from the deck above, the stale air weighted with shouting, bloodthirsty voices and split by the boom of constant cannon-fire.

"See here, son; you go join your mummy in her den and I'll come and fetch ye once we've bombed the be-jesus out of these blasted Brits. Then maybe you'll get to practice a bit with that nice little dagger of yours." He smiles and looks down at me, but there's no warmth in his eyes. "They'll never be expectin' a little eight-year old lad to come and stab them round the knees, will they?"

"I'm nine years old today, daddy." I say flatly, looking out over the crew scrambling over the deck like dogs and firing their cannons at the approaching _St. Mary_, her bow chopping through the glossy waves and closing in on our port side like a slinking dragon. "Mum said that I was born on this day. And that there was a terrible storm."

Dad sighs, roughly patting my shoulder and sliding his gaze out over the dusky harbor, dirty and shadowy in the bright afternoon sunlight.

"Aye, what a terrible storm it was, Jack. I remember fearin' that we wouldn't make it, and I wouldn't ever get to see the face of my little newborn son."

We stand side by side, silent and looking out over Calico Port. Surely today we will leave it with the _Crest_'s treasure holds bulging with gold. Dad gives me a little shove, pushing me towards the door of Mum's den.

"Go on now, my big, nine-year-old lad; yer Mum's probably getting' lonely in there, and I've got a port to sack."

I take one last look at the screaming St. Mary, slicing through the chopping waters of the bay, her deck swarming with the men with the red coats. The British. Sighing like the wind, I seize the jeweled doorknob and retreat into the warming darkness, my Mum holding me softly in her arms.

I hate it in here, crouching in the fuzzy blackness of Mum's den. She's blown out her little scented candles, and the smoke lingers in the stale, flat air that feels funny as I suck it down into my lungs, rough and velvety. Mum won't stop talking, telling me over and over again that we'll be alright, that Daddy knows what he's doing, and he'll blast that _St. Mary _to itty bitty little splinters that will sink down to the bottom of the bay and never be seen again. But if she's so sure, why does she keep on saying it? I strain my ears past her babbling, hysterical voice and listen to the cries of the cannons and the shouts and screams of battle. I want to know what's happening, and I want to help. Maybe it was something in his face, but I don't think that my father can do it. I sit still, Mum's velvet sofa rubbing up uncomfortably against my skin, listening intently. I wonder where Mr. Smith is; surely he can't be firing cannons, what, with his missing hand? All I can do is listen, and it makes me angry. I finger the beads in my hair and stare straight ahead into the black, imaging that I can see the _St. Mary_, bearing down upon us in a cloud of gunpowder.

All of a sudden, it all goes quiet. I strain my ears, but I can hear nothing, and panic strikes its icy blade into my chest, my heart thumping crazily. Mum sits, up, her eyes wide in alarm and shining in the darkness.

"What on earth…?"

I slide sideways out her grasp and tiptoe towards the door, putting my eye to the keyhole and peering out into the streaming light. At first I see nothing but the mottled deck, and I groan and sweep my gaze desperately over the scene; my eye catches a swatch of flashing red and my heart sinks, my breath catching in my throat and the blood draining from my face. I am frozen against the door, my fingers clutching helplessly into the wood. The British are aboard the _Crest_. Screams and battle cries burst through the rusted silence, and I can tell that the crew has noticed it too. Mum bites her knuckles to keep from crying, and I stay hunched up against the door, unable to move. Terrifying sounds pound my ears; the metallic, resounding clang of swords in combat, the swift, sleek strike and pained groan of a fatal blow, the gasp and thud of a slit throat, and the bleated screech of a head shot wound. My breath spills erratically out of my mouth, sickeningly heavy and sticky against my cheeks. Moving sluggishly, my hand fumbles and grips the handle of my dagger, pulling it deliberately from its sheath with the soft hiss of grating metal. I put the blade to my lips, shaking like a ship in a typhoon and cowering in the cover of the dark…a darkness that is suddenly flooded with light as the door is wrenched open with a horrifying kind of power. Panic exploding like a pistol, I teeter and crumple down onto the carpet, the dagger clanging to the ground and a pair of large boots stepping swiftly over me, a blur of red swooshing past my eyes. I struggle to think as Mum lets out a horribly piercing screech. There is British man in the den. The message suddenly rings out loud and crystal clear in my mind, and my reflexes kick in. Panting desperately, I pull myself to my knees and snatch up my dagger from the ground, all in one swift movement. My hands shaking my hair flying, and my teeth gritted painfully, I jab the blade, which is glinting in the sun with a strange sort of unearthly sheen. The warm, wet rush of blood cascades over my fingers as a cry of pain bursts from the redcoat's chapped lips; groaning and desperately tearing at his stomach, the man crumples to the ground, my blade stuck deep into his ribs, the growing scarlet-black stain on his shirt smelling like hot rust and sticky salt, all mixed together in a kind of a nauseous blend. Mum is scrunched up against the far wall, her body pressed against the wood and her eyes wide with terror, her chestnut hair rustled and her chest heaving. I stand there in the doorway, the sun hot on my back and my shadow looming over the twitching, gasping body of the dying redcoat, my hands balled into fists and my palms clammy with sweat. I've just killed a man….I cannot believe it, but I've just killed a man. Numbly I bend over and grasp the hilt of my dagger, wincing as I slide it from the man's chest, the silver-shine of the blade dulled by the dripping coat of burning, scarlet blood.

"Jackie…..Oh, my little Jackie…"

Mum's astounded words float up to my ears, and I look up at her, still numb. My eyes connect with hers, and then I realize that I've just rescued her, saved her from the British man who surely would have killed her with a quick slash of his gleaming sword. I've killed him, one of the enemy, and I've saved my mother's life. A kind of power surges through me, and I feel it all through my body. And as I stand proud, gazing dazedly over the mangled battle on the deck, something hits me; it's my father, slashing and hollering with his deep, menacing voice and his eyes that could pierce like a cutlass. His hair flies like a cloud of dust, his jaw jutted out in a way that terrifies me, strikes me like a cannonball. I'd never seen him battle so hard, and suddenly, it's all I can do just to remain upright. The redcoats are surrounding him, and my stomach sinks through the deck and sloshes around in the bilge, in the darkest and dankest bowels of the _Crest_. An especially tall redcoat leaps up over my father, slashing his sword in a silver flurry, and my breath leaves me as the dark red blood splatters and slops onto the deck, covering it in shower of the murky scarlet drops. Dad staggers and gasps, grasping his side, his fingers stained crimson and his teeth gritted with pain. And as the recoat smiles victoriously, I catch a strange look in his eyes; it's as if a splatter of my father's blood has dripped into his eyes, and they flicker a venomous ruby color in the glaring sun, his teeth flashing with a horrible, deathly white light. Fear and hatred grips me, racking my body, and I find myself dashing out into the fray, the light dazzling my eyes and Mum screaming frantically aft of me. Grimacing icily, my arm flicks and the dagger streaks through the air like a silver blur, striking the bloody-eyed man in the stomach, dark red rivers spilling from his flesh and trickling down onto the deck. In a flash, the life is gone from his eyes and he is falling; in the same moment, the small knot of redcoats break from their shock, whirling and hurling themselves at me, their blades glinting coldly and their mouths bursting with unfurled cries of rage. I catch my dad in the eyes and break into a run, furiously sprinting across the battle-torn deck, leaping over bloodied corpses and shattered bottles of rum, their sharp stench stinging my nostrils. My hair flies behind me and I tear away until skidding to a stop up against the closed door of the den, the heels of my boots slipping a bit, the splintery deck slick and salty with mingling blood and seawater. I stare helplessly at the solid cabin, and it's then that I realize that I have no weapon. A rifle cocks behind aft of me, and its fire snaps the air.


	7. Gunpowder

_Gunpowder_

Unthinking, I throw myself off to the side; biting chills zip down my spine as I feel the cold steel whistling through my hair, tracing on my scalp a line of fire. Burning wetness explodes and I feel it slithering through my hair and trickling down my forehead in hot, sticky rivers. Terror seizes me, but I gather myself and sprint off, careening around the charred debris and the feebly stirring bodies, my breath coming fast and thick and my feet slamming painfully as I tear through the carnage, working my way back towards the lower stairway and the storage holds down below, a desperate idea sparking inside of my spinning head.

Gunshots pound in my eardrums and I quicken my pace, my teeth gritted and my scalp stinging something horrible. Bullets whiz past me, smashing the glass of the lanterns, the shards tinkling down in an icy shower; striking the bosoms of innocent passersby, groaning in agony and slumping lifelessly onto the bloodstained deck with deadened eyes; ricocheting off of hard metal objects with hollow, metallic clangs and slicing off in another direction. Horror pounding through my veins, I take a flying leap and drop down through the hatch, my stomach swooning as I slip into the cool darkness of the cargo hold, my feet slamming down painfully and stinging as if they are stuck full of shards of glass. Screeching voices and loudly snapping gunshots warn me of my approaching pursuers, and I swiftly right myself and dart off around the corner, heading determinately for where I know to be the gunpowder storage area, my eyes narrowed.

Skidding around down the hall, I thrash and tumble into a stop, spotting a familiar face and immediately halting, losing my balance with the pull of my sheer momentum. It is Mr. Smith, standing wordlessly over me, his mouth hanging open and a keg of gunpowder tucked under his arm, his legs poised mid-step, ready to take the barrel up on deck. His lips move wordlessly and I pull myself to my feet; I don't have any time to explain. Gunshots and footsteps pounding in my pursuit, I desperately launch myself into Smith's bent arm, slamming into his shoulder and knocking the keg loose; Smith cries out as it rolls across the ground and splits clean open, showering the floor in a milky cloud of black dust. Panting and my fingers shaking, I seize Smith's rarely-used pistol from his belt, cocking it and aiming it at the pile of gunpowder kegs that stand piled up in front of the hold's doorway. A flash of red brands my eyes and I fire, the shot splitting the air and drowning Smith's stammering, fraught cries of protest. Every hair on my head tingles for a brief second, right before the very air explodes in a writhing mass of hellish fire, the heat blasting me backwards and drying my eyes, the smoke stinging ruthlessly; Smith seizes my elbow and we drop to the floor, my head swirling and the blistering fire scorching my clothes and my hair. I press my cheek hard into the wood of the floor, a fresh wave of sticky hot blood spilling from my torn scalp and trickling down into my eyes, stinging, sweltering drops that tinge the world scarlet. Screaming…I hear agonized wails and cries that hover hauntingly in the searing air…I squeeze my eyes shut even tighter, my eyelids crushing and burning. Surely all hell must be breaking loose. It's all I can do not to scream.

The next thing I know, my limp body is scratching against the splintery wood and I can barely breathe, gasping and blinking desperately. Smith's grimy arm is locked around my upper chest, his muscles crushing my windpipe as he drags me desperately down the corridor, his breath coming in ragged gasps. The ship seems strangely silent. All I can hear are Smith's greedy breaths, the exhausted thump of his dragging footsteps, the scrape of cloth as my legs slide across the wooden floor, and the usual creaks and groans of the _Crest_, gently rolling to and fro. My head spins, and my forehead burns as a stream of red-hot blood trickles from my clipped scalp to slide down across my skin. Unable to speak, I tear weakly at Smith's arm, my lungs burning for oxygen. The man's head whips around, his slate-grey eyes glinting with his terror. There is a heavy second and then his grip vanishes; I slide and collapse into a shaking heap on the ground, hacking the smoke from my searing lungs, my eyes smarting and my body blistering from the fire.

"Oh, for god's sake, Jack! Now why did you have to go and pull off a stunt like that? For the lord almighty, you could have killed us all!"

Smith's hysterical voice cuts through the fading haze of my vision, and I fight against the crushing numbness that is pooling in my head, sloshing dizzily and seeping down to blur my eyes. But it is a cool, calming oblivion, and I struggle not to succumb.

"D..did I…Did I get them…Mr. Smith?" I manage, my limbs dragging uselessly as Smith shoves me up against the wall, bending down and piercing me with his steely gaze. My words pour out slow and thick, like molasses. My tongue is heavy and it tastes of fire. My eyes slip closed, exhaustion tugging at my body.

"Who, boy, _who_?" Mr. Smith cries hoarsely, shaking me by the shoulders and brushing the singed hair from my face. He gasps helplessly as he pulls his hand from my head, his fingers sticky with crimson.

"The red…the red men. Th…the men in the red….coats."

My eyelids shudder painfully and I grit my teeth; Smith touches my torn scalp, examining it where it had been clipped by the icy, British bullet.

"Did I get them?"

My voice leaks weakly from my chapped lips, not more than a whisper.

"Yes, Little Sparrow," Smith breathes, tearing his sash and knotting the fabric round my head. "You sure got them; _that _I can say."

A faint smile tugs at the corners of my mouth; there is a hot rush running down my forehead and I lose the battle, grinning and sinking gratefully into nothingness. At least I got them.


	8. The Sunlight and the Voices

_The Sunlight and the Voices_

Another British ship had broken the horizon and the crew had to flee port, empty handed. That's what I heard at least, from the murmured voices that rose and fell with the splashing of the waves and wound themselves along with the wind, the warm, fresh wind that swirled down from the deck and pooled itself down in the captain's quarters, in which I had awoken. The breeze had been cool and luscious, teeming with the soft sweetness of tropical blooms and the warming, wild saltiness of the Caribbean seas. It had wafted around me, rousing me, filling me like sparkling clear water does a glass. My eyes had popped open and the streaming sunlight had pricked me with its blinding brilliance, shimmering golden and splitting into dazzling prisms of light that imprinted their brightness onto the insides of my eyelids. I'd had to blink for a while in order to clear their winking forms from my vision. Breathing deeply, I had painfully lifted myself from the cot and gazed dumbly about the musty cabin, my head throbbing and my eyes scanning my father's dusty piles of frayed books, magnificent peacock quills, browned maps and charts, and scattered navigational devices. The soft, fuzzy light from his hanging lantern had played across the wooden walls as it swung to and fro, rolling with the sloshing rhythm of the waves. And that was when I had heard the voices, the crew's voices. I had not been able to quite tell what they were saying, but my ears had caught my own name in every one of their hushed, disbelieving sentences.

I stand by the railing, staring out over the shimmering sea, the glossy crests of the black waves glittering like molten silver in the white light of the full moon. The breeze rolls out over me, softly fingering every inch of my body, pressing my clothes to my skin and lifting my coils of coarse black-brown hair. My bead-strings whip gently in the wind and I let out a long sigh, feeling the breeze draw my warm breath and spin it away, flying out like a spirit over the ocean. The Great Bear winks down at me from the silky midnight heavens overhead, and I can nearly feel all of their glittery little eyes, all of the little stars drifting and watching me. It's a bit scary, but simultaneously comforting. No matter where I go, they will always be there, floating high above my head. I look down into the swirling obsidian waves and watch them as the bow of the Crest slices them into clouds of diamond-glittering spray, the jewel-like droplets catching the moonlight and shimmering with an odd, florescent glow. I smile.

"Hello, daddy."

He pauses just aft of me, stunned; my ears had caught the splash of his great captain's boots, approaching me. His lips move wordlessly, and the stars glimmer in the silvery steel of his drawn sword. Deftly, I snatch it from his hands, spinning it silently, the blade whispering in the night air. What a beautiful blade it is. He stares at me, and I grin back at him. I know what he is going to say. It is only fair. I had saved his life.

"Daddy, will I get a sword just like yours, when you train me?" I ask, the moon alight in my eyes as I hand his sword back to him, my gut spilling over with excitement. My father grins weakly, sheathing his blade but avoiding my eyes.

"Yes, Jack. Ye will have a fine sword of your own, and I will teach you to wield it, to strike all enemies of pirates down upon the deck with it. And why, you'll be the most fearsome pirate in _all_ of the world's oceans."

The news warms me, but only on the inside. There is something cold, and I can see it in dad's unfeeling eyes. I remain silent as he turns away, sloshing back across the sodden deck. The stars wink above me, their shimmering reflections spinning in the black waves before the bow of the Crest slashes them into spiraling fragments that are lost among the icy, churning waters. I lean on the railing, watching.


	9. Port Santiago

_Port Santiago _

My father keeps on talking about it, about me and my sword-the one I haven't got yet. He's excited, his eyes glittering like the sun on the water and his constant flow of words bubbling and bursting full of his enthusiasm.

"We're going to Port Santiago, Jack, and when we get there, yer going to go and get yerself the prettiest damn sword that man's eyes have ever laid upon! It'll be a beaut'; I know it, lad."

I smile and nod my head, the wind ripping through my hair. But somehow, I cannot believe him. The_ Crest_ sails on, and I spend the days watching him as he limps across the deck, still sore from his sword wound; he bellows at the crew, his fingers jabbing the air with such a might that some of the other men are sent stumbling in its wake. There is iciness in his expression, something that I hadn't noticed before. It chills all who look at it, and it sends my heart quivering like a leaf. It scares me. I stare out over the scratched mirror of the sea, the sky and the ocean so wide and blue that it sends my mind reeling. Maybe it'll never end, and we'll float out here forever, with only the blue nothingness and the winking stars to guide us.

"Just you wait, son, just you wait."

Dad pats my back, sensing my uneasiness.

"It's just those damn winds up there; it's been too still lately. We haven't been able to get anywhere too fast thanks to those blasted things. But you wait; when we get to Port Santiago, you'll fetch yerself a sword and it'll be the best sword that ye can possibly get. Those blades they make in Santiago are from the heavens, I tell ye: sturdy enough to slice skin like butter, light enough to float in yer hand, sharp enough to sing in the wind when ye twirl it yonder. It'll be worth it, son, that's a promise."

I smile again, but my heart is empty. It will take at least a month to reach Santiago at this pace. My eyes dart over the reaching horizon, wondering if Santiago is even where I yearn to go.


	10. The Sea and the Spinning Needle

_The Sea and the Spinning Needle_

It is another faceless, unseeing, pitch-black night. I stand at the heights of the crow's nest with my eyes to the heavens, my skin frozen numb by the chilling, bitter cold wind. The great black sea yawns below me, gaping, and the waters dark in the moon-less night like the void at the edge of the world. I cannot even catch a glimpse of the friendly stars, for they are obscured by a gauzy thick blanket of surging cloud, swirling and choking out all that lies so far above me. It is frightening. The waves and the wind hiss like a great sea beast, and I and the Great Bear cannot see each other. To think that I had thought of us as being nigh inseparable.

My eyes pop in terror-from the ocean suddenly bursts a monstrous roar and my body breaks out in cold sweat, panic striking me in the gut like an icy knife. There is a haunting whisper like a spirit and a beastly white plume looms out over me, stretching out from the icy reaches of the water and slinking through the frozen air, sliding its wispy, skeletal fingers for my white, exposed throat. I stand there paralyzed, staring up at it with eyes as wide as the sea, unable to think. The wind hisses again and my trembling knees give out below me; my back smacks against the damp rail of the crow's nest and a scream bursts free from my throat. I find myself plummeting downward, soaring and tumbling and my stomach swooping sickeningly in the air above me, the deck stretching beneath me, to swallow me whole. My fingers tear blindly at the rushing air, clawing desperately and feverishly for something to break my fall. A gasps leaks from my lips as the rough strength of a rope brushes my flailing hands; I seize it in my fingers and throw my arms around it, swirling and twisting and slipping along the length of the rope, the scratchy friction burning my palms like fire. My head spinning and my hair whipping around in a frenzied cloud, I grunt and hook my legs around the slender, swaying cord, the fire slashing my thighs and the mist seeping into my lungs and freezing me. Hot tears burning my eyes, I clamp down tighter, my heart threatening to burst free from my chest and fly out over the water, to be consumed by the mass of faceless mist, crawling and creeping and blanketing the _Crest_ under its palms. My body racked with sobs, I clutch the rope even harder in my hands, my grip slackening from the sweltering pain cut across my fingers in a throbbing, scarlet slash, biting down mercilessly into my flesh. I will not fall….I will not; I _must_ not.

My eyes streaming, I crush the rope in my hands, gritting my teeth against the pain, the pain like thorns being driven into my flesh. The wind hisses and mercilessly whips me around, but I hold on fast, unwilling to let go.

Suddenly, something iron-strong clasps itself around my waist and my breath leaves me in a horrified stream; the tiny burst of warm air is seized by the breeze and spun away as I am pulled downwards like a stone, my heart fluttering and my stomach plummeting.

"Good grief, lad; I don't know why the captain lets you wander an inch from his side, for god's sake!"

It's Mr. Smith. I wrench my eyes open and find Smith's arms wrapped firmly around my waist and the deck right below me; his right sleeve is blown back by the breeze and I can clearly see that useless stump of his missing hand. But somehow, it doesn't frighten me anymore. Smith deposits me on my feet and I sway unsteadily for a second, my palms shining a blistered, throbbing bright red. He shakes his head, his short, smoky white hair billowing like steam.

"What have you been doing, throwing yourself from the crow's nest like that, boy? Trying to fly?"

I stand still, suddenly unable to speak. There is no way that I can explain.

"It's nothing, Mr. Smith; I'm sorry."

Smith shrugs helplessly, patting me on my trembling shoulder.

"Oh, everything's all right; I didn't mean it. Not like it makes much of a difference; _how_ many times have I already saved you from killing yourself with one of those crazy gags of yours? You have one hell of a talent for trouble; that's something I can say."

A small smile gently lifts the corners of my mouth, and Smith returns it. We stand in silence for a long moment, the wind howling and the sea gasping. Smith's eyes scan the ocean, distaste coloring his expression.

"Mighty dreadful weather, isn't it? What with this god-awful mist coming in; probably won't be able to see a blasted thing in a few hours time, I reckon."

He sniffed at the misty air, the droplets settling in his hair.

"Aye; probably not."

"Practicing your pirate talk, are you?" he laughs, and I turn away, my cheeks flushing. "Ah, it's strange how proper you speak, boy. Why, you practically sound like the son of an Englishman."

He gives me a knowing look and I grimace, tucking my hands into my pockets.

"But I suppose you're mighty excited, with good old Captain Sparrow going to train you and all those things that the boys have been yammering about. How about it, lad?"

"I…well; Well, I really don't really know what I want anymore."

Silence hangs itself back above our heads, and I feel a twinge of regret. I hadn't meant to say that.

"Well, come here, Little Sparrow, and I've got something that can help fix that…"

He begins to dig in his pockets and I spin round toward him, curiosity burning in my eyes.

"What; what have you got?"

The words fly out of my mouth like the wind, and Mr. Smith chuckles and gestures for me to follow him before striding back over the deck and vanishing down below. I dash down the stairwell in his wake, unable to wait another second; I feel the passion igniting in my chest, and I yearn to know of Smith's mysterious object. The little heels of my boots clack on the steps as I descend the stairs into the syrupy, golden lantern-light, the chill of the air receding slightly. Smith is rummaging about in the linens of his cot and my gaze fixes itself upon him, unable to look away.

"Ah ha; here's the little bugger….here we go…"

From the depth of his mess of blankets, he pulls out a small, dark object that is small enough to fit right into the palm of his hand; I stare at it, entranced. It's a little black box-looking thing, and it has a hinged door that Smith snaps open with his thumb; right then, I know what it is. It's a little compass with a slightly yellowed face and a black needle that tilts around drunkenly, suddenly halting to a stop and sliding in the opposite direction, back and forth, randomly. I raise an eyebrow. The compass-face has no directions written on it.

"Why does it…?"

Smith silences me with a wave of his hand, smiling in a way that is almost wise. The _Crest _groans beneath us.

"This is a very special compass, Jack…First I'll tell you that."

It glints in the dim, flickering amber light of the swinging lanterns, the needle still twitching erratically. I stare hard at it, but it doesn't steady.

"It's broken," I say, my stomach sinking.

"No, not broken; special. There is no compass like this one, and I've kept it to myself for many a decade. But now I think it should move to another's hands, just for its own sake. It must get bored with all of my own little trivial wants."

I look disbelievingly at Smith, my frustration building. He's not making any sense at all.

"But it's not _alive_, Mr. Smith; it's only a compass. And a compass with a broken needle and no North written on it there."

He smiles again, placing the black compass deliberately into my blistered palm.

"Ah, but this compass you don't use to find North, Jack Sparrow."

I stare at it in my hand and the needle twirls around for a bit before slowly stuttering to a halt, trembling and pointing out somewhere I cannot tell.

"Hmmm…" Smith murmurs thoughtfully, rubbing at his scruffy chin. "Now I wonder what it is that it's pointing you towards, lad."

I stare at it again, unimpressed. A broken compass is not what I had in mind.

"One thing more, Little Sparrow; you mustn't let your father see it. Keep it a secret; heed my words, there are many terrible things a plenty that yearn to take this little compass to do the most horrible of deeds. You hear, now?"

I nod, blank inside, and the sea roars beneath us, bellowing like a whale while I lay in my bed many crawling hours later, irritation and the compass's needle spinning in my head. What a long night this is.


	11. Places at the End of the World

_Places at the End of the World_

Our journey is long and hard, and the weeks blur into months that slide past like the wind. Days pass with nothing but the rush of the eternal sea to accompany us, and the _Crest_ crawls and crawls determinedly towards the distant horizon but it never gets any closer. We trade with other pirates out at sea in order to restock our water and rations. The crew wakes up every day and retreats down below by night, sore and aching and irritable. I spend many a night watch crouching near the stairs, listening to their groans and grumblings.

"This is gettin' to be too much…Just where is this wretched Port Santiago anyhows?"

"Dunno but I'm sure that it's far, far away. Otherwise we'd be there alreadys."

"Aye; talk about a bloody waste of time. God knows where this'll lead us; we'll probably sail too far and end up falling over the Edge."

"Don't be a fool, Holliman; the captain ain't nearly that much of a brainless git. He's a good man; he'd never let the _Crest_ go down in such a way."

"Now I wouldn't be so sure of that; this is man that nearly got us all killed in Calico-his little son was the one who struck the blow that saved all of our hides. Heaven knows where Joseph's route be takin' us…"

"How _dare _ye say such a devilish thing!; why, insultin' the captain like that! He'd have your head if he were to hear ye blabberin' all of that awful nonsense!"

The talk turns into an all-out brawl, and I cannot listen anymore. I drift across the deck and gaze glassily over the boiling sea, the mist swirling all around me in the chilling night air. With trembling hands, I finger the black compass and pull it from my pocket, hunching my shoulders to hide it as I study it carefully, my eyes locked on the needle as it trembles back and forth, shivering and shaking as it were also frightened of the greedy clouds of mist, howling and reaching for me as they ride on the gusts of the icy trade wind. A heavy moment settles around me as the needle slows, ever so slowly crawling across the compass-face, yearning towards a single direction, where it finally comes to a shaking stop, still quivering and shuddering as it points out over the ragged ocean and far away through the mist. I look out to where it points, but I can see nothing. Nothing but the rolling masses of ocean fog against the blackness of the sky. Nothing at all. My mind reeling, I snap the black case shut and stare at the compass sitting in my scarred palm. To where is it pointing me? What does it yearn to show? I think of Smith, and remember how he spoke of the compass tiring of his 'trivial wants'. Does the compass do something that I want? I ponder on it for hours of every long day and weeks of every long month. Where is the needle pointing, and why? One thing I'm sure of; the compass does not point in the same direction we are headed. Wherever it is leading me, it must be somewhere even more distant than Port Santiago, some strange place at the end of the world, one place where I hope we don't end up. I spend empty hours lying in my cot, staring through the wavering lamplight at the black case clutched in my hand. What a useless, broken thing it is; I'm almost tempted to heave it over the railing and watch it sink down into the oblivion of the consuming blue depths, but something holds me back. I cannot leave it, and it never leaves my belt loop, tucked and hidden away under my shirt. It is all I have in these pointless days of nothingness.


	12. Waves

_Waves_

They are everywhere, and we cannot seem to be rid of them. They lap at the _Crest_ like puppies when the winds don't blow, and they thrash and scream and yank at us like a beast when the wind is high. I stare at them to pass the time; they slide past me like ripples on a mirror, only to be sliced and torn into the flying diamond spray by the ship's bow. I had felt them against my skin the day that Skinner (the great fool) had knocked me overboard; they had sloshed over my head and smothered me, and for I second I had thought that I was going to die, and I'd never break through the surface again.

Frozen with despair, I had slipped into darkness while the light played on the clear undulating surface that twisted the sky into a million blues, the waves rippling and parading triumphantly above my head. The water had been icy cold on my skin; I had hung suspended in silence, swishing weightlessness, like being caught in a dream. The waves of light had played on my body and the world had dazzled with the clearest of blue; my lungs had burned for air but I couldn't move. All until the crystalline stillness was shattered like ice as someone had plunged down through the surface, dew-like bubbles clouding the water as his grimy fingers caught hold of my sleeve, kicking and dragging me up into the palest of blue, towards the filtering shafts of sunlight. The hush had been suddenly vanquished as my head had broken through the surface, gasping and coughing, the Crest groaning and the crew hollering and the water thundering with the voice of a million wave-breaks. Gulls had screamed overhead as I was pulled back up onto the deck and out of the water, shivering and trembling and dripping with salt that Mum had kissed from my face as she had thrown her arms around my shoulders and pulled me tightly against her, crying at the waves, for they had nearly swallowed me.

Now they gently drive our rowboats forward, sloshing and hissing and lapping up against the sterns, back where I sit and watch them, my fingers closed around my compass that is still bound securely to my belt. I am lucky not to have lost it to the hungry ocean, to the water that rages and destroys and strips men of anything and everything. I simply cannot lose it; the broken thing is far too important to be lost, especially now that we are landing, landing finally at Port Santiago, our hearts high and the sun smiling down on our backs as we cross the harbor, the crew shouting and raising their swords, the blades glittering like the water. And while they pillage the small town of all of its riches, I will go out alone and fetch myself a sword just as fine as theirs. One that will sing in the wind and float in my hand and slice flesh like butter. I have already killed many a man, and I am not afraid. It has been many long months, and I feel much too old to wait any longer. Today I will find my prize, I tell myself, gripping the edges of the rowboat as we near the shore, my heart pounding and the waves hissing and churning beneath me. The ocean swirls round my thighs as we wade onto the beach, the crew charging at the screaming town with their blades and their pistols glittering, their eyes alight with a fire that I haven't seen since the day of the clash against the red-wearing men of the _St. Mary_. Feeling wild and alive, I steal off into Santiago, skirting the streets and hoisting myself up onto the roofs, dashing and leaping and dashing again, my shadow flying and my hair whipping behind me. _I will find my prize_, I whisper to myself, the compass thumping against my waist as I make a flying jump, thudding back onto the roof of the next house. _I will find my prize. _


	13. A Girl

_A Girl_

My shirt sticking to my sweaty back and the blinding sun glaring down at me, I squint in the brightness and peer down over the edge of the roof, scanning the dusty, baking city streets of Santiago. There's not a soul around, and all is disturbingly silent; all quiet except the murmur of distant gunshots and sword-duels and the terrified screams of the townspeople. All of the crowds are probably either out by the beach (unfortunately for them) or hiding away in their homes, shaking and quaking and praying for their lives. Either way, the emptiness of the town makes my stealth pointless, so I cling to a rafter and swing lightly down from the low roof, landing neatly on my feet on the dusty, cobbled street. I straighten up and look around once more; still, there is no man in sight. The road is narrow and dirty, and it is lined with rickety, unkempt shops and taverns and apartments that look as if one strong wind could send them splintering down like a trembling pile of twigs. I scan the row of deserted, parched buildings that seem to stoop slightly over me like dogs dying of thirst, my eyes searching each window for the characteristic signs of a blacksmith's shop. The air sits hot, dusty, and stagnant, pressing down on me, the sun blaring in the pale sky. My shadow stretches out before me and my hair is itchy against the back of my dampened neck. I breathe and am about to take a step when a faded, hanging wooden sign on the front of a tattered spinner's shop groans slightly; my keen senses suddenly kick into gear, my body stiffening and my gaze darting wildly about. Something is amiss, and I can sense it in every particle of the dry, salty air surrounding me; I noiselessly slip backwards into the filtering shade of the doorway of the spinner's shop, the sign creaking ominously above my head. My breath coming hot and fast, I grope at my belt sash and finger the broken black compass and the smooth, cool metal of my new pistol, the one that my father had fetched for me to use. Pressing myself against the splintered frame of the shop's open front door, I strain my ears and catch the faint, rollicking laughter of a pack of young boys, their footsteps clacking on the cobblestone as they make their way up the road, chattering and chuckling amongst themselves. My heart seizes in my throat and I stare straight ahead with wide eyes; it's been so long since I've seen boys my age, and I am almost afraid of meeting their eyes when they turn round the corner. God knows why they're still walking the streets like nothing is happening. My body freezes and I hold my breath, my fingers closing around the pistol bound to my belt and hoping that I won't have to use it.

The boys' laughter spills through the air and they round the bend and come striding into view; there are about five of them in the little pack, and they are all rather finely dressed with finely stitched tunics, silk white shirts, dark velvety breeches, and loud-heeled leather shoes that clack sharply on the stone as the wind their way down the street without a care in the world. They all look around my age, although there is one tall boy among them with shining hair the color of bleached straw, and his scruffy chin and his cold emerald eyes make him appear a bit older than the rest of them. His hair is tied back in a smooth tail, and he walks with proud, long strides, his chin high and his laughter as cool as his chilling gaze. What are these little gold-gilded brats doing in such a ramshackle town as Santiago? My fingers clutch the handle of my pistol and my eyes follow the herd as they frolic slowly along the road, inching past me, their voices rambling and spilling into one big, inaudible jumble.

Suddenly, the tall boy straightens and whirls around, his blonde hair gleaming in the sun and his eyes flashing straight into mine, the contact like static. He has spotted me, and I grit my teeth and step forward into the light, my hand still on my pistol and my expression grim. The whole group of boys swivels around and I feel all of their eyes on me, some kind of strange expression tugging at their mouths. A scornful smile stretches on the tall boy's face, and suddenly it strikes me: the boy's strange expressions are mocking me.

"Well, so it be!" the tall boy exclaims, his cold grin spreading even wider as his hands gesture towards me in elaborate amazement. "A little lady, walking out here in these old streets! Now I don't remember seeing your pretty face out here in the ghetto; what be your name, miss?"

He sinks into a deep, sweeping bow. "I, my sweet, am called Daniel. Daniel Thoroughburg."

He mocks me and I know it; the boys burst into laughter and my eyebrows raise, crossing my arms across my chest and saying nothing. The pistol is cleverly hidden away, tucked invisibly into my baggy sleeve, the metal icy against my skin. And I know I will not rest until a silver bullet has stricken the head of this arse of a boy.

Daniel is raising his pale eyebrows at my stubborn silence; I glare straight at him, boring into the deadly ice of his gaze.

"Quiet one, you are….for a bloody rotten pirate."

"Noticed, have you? Took you long enough."

"Believe it or not, I _have_ noticed; you must be the only little _female_ pirate I've ever laid eyes on (though I wish I hadn't); perhaps they'll spare you the gallows because of it-you never know, but even **filth** has got to have hope…"

Hatred and fury boils up like a hurricane in my veins, and I wish with all of my being to whip out my gun and shut the boy up, for good. But not while I've still got the element of surprise on my side.

Daniel spits at my feet and then turns back towards the others for a second; for a fleeting moment I think they are going to turn and walk away, but then the blonde boy suddenly whips back around and his hand flies at me in a blur-My teeth gritted, I swoop to the ground and lash a foot at his knee; he cries out in pain and staggers as my heel crunches into the exposed bone. And then suddenly there is pressure on my throat and I am seized from behind by another one of the boys; his arm is locked around my neck and his fingers tear mercilessly into the roots of my long hair. My eyes watering, I clench my jaw to keep myself from crying, my hands blindly tearing at the arm around my throat. Daniels looms over me, his triumphant smile slightly discolored by his obvious hurt.

"God; look at this, Daniel," says the boy holding me; his fingers are closed around a string of my beaded hair. "The little maggot's got all this crud in his hair and guess what-he's wearing eyeliner! The git practically **is** a bloody lady!"

Laughter rings and my hatred explodes and I find the pistol whipping out of my sleeve, my finger trembling on the trigger and the gun cocking with a deadly click that echoes like a grenade in the terrified silence.

"Holy…."

"_Get your __**bloody**__ hands off me…_"

I shove the barrel against the throat of my captor, my voice hissing venomously; his breath leaves him in a horror-struck gasp, his blood pounding uselessly. He doesn't move, and my lip curls.

"NOW!" I cry, about to squeeze the trigger when I am hastily released, the shocked boy darting off down the street like a frightened bird and the rest of the crowd following suit, Daniel limping and wincing with every step, sending me back piercing looks that practically strike me dead. I catch a few more footsteps and then they vanish, swallowed up by the hazy maze of the dusty Santiago streets, leaving me alone and sprawled awkwardly on the cobblestone pavement, the pistol still cocked and shuddering in my unsteady hand. I still feel that undying loathing pounding in my veins, and I yearn to seize my own heart and tear it free in a hot flying splatter of dark blood. I have lost something inside of me, and I swiftly pull myself upright and drift away, my cheeks shining and streaked with tears. I don't ever want to look at myself now.


	14. Like Air and Fire

_Like Air and Fire_

In order to regain my sanity, it takes a bit of wandering the arid streets of Santiago like a damned soul lost in the darkest depths of hell. At first I can't seem to stop the shaking, and the burning tears keep leaking from my heavy eyes and slipping down my cheeks in salty, shining streaks. I halt and wipe at them with my sleeve; I pull my arm away from my sticky face and the white fabric is blackened from the bleeding liner that is still drawn round my eyes. My teeth clench and another wave of emotion washes over me; I bite my tongue till I taste the blood and move on, forcing myself to scan the narrow streets for a smithy, for the possibility of finding the sword. The sun is hot overhead and the brightness is shattered into winking prisms of blurry light that sparkle and dance against my vision, still wet and distorted from the tears. Daniel and company will most likely return with an entire squad of armed Brits, and I don't want my father to have traveled all the way to Santiago only to have me return to the _Crest_ empty handed. Or not to return at all.

My heart sinking and my head floating away in fuzzy anguish, I glance dejectedly at every dusty shop window until I come across the one that smells of heat and smoke and the sharp bite of fresh steel. I swivel and stare, wiping my eyes once more and fingering my pistol that is again hanging from my belt. The front window bears a worn wooden sign that proudly announces the tacky workshop as the home of 'James and Co., makers of fine swords since 1642'. A fine place to begin, I suppose, and I attempt (futilely) to rub all traces of smeared liner from my sticky cheeks before drawing in a deep breath and pushing open the front door, which stands swinging and ajar in the torpid air.

The shop is about a million degrees hotter inside than it is outside, and I feel the sweat against my back and decide to make the visit a short one. The room is rather small, with a dirt floor and a smoky mantle and racks upon racks of swords whose blades glimmer in the slanted light that falls from the wide, slatted windows. I sweep the room with my eyes and fail to notice any other people in the building, so I wipe my sticky palms on my trousers and stride forward, my watery gaze locked on the heaps of fine weapons that lie glittering in front of me. The embers crackling weakly in the fireplace, I stand frozen over the swords for a moment, my eyes wide in awe and my hands poised, my scarred fingers shaking with anticipation. But then I remember Daniel and the scoundrels and I quickly bend down and seize the elaborate golden hilt of a particularly long one; its magnificent blade shimmers like fine silver in the golden light, playing a wavelike dancing reflection over the rough, smoky clay brick walls. My lips parting a bit in the pure beauty of this superior weapon, I give it a few test strikes that whip through the air with a kind of slashing grace-I can hear its razor-like blade singing as it slashes in front of my face in a polished, silvery arc. Bliss bubbling up inside of me, I grin and slice the sword upwards, ripping elegantly through the filtering beams of light with a faint, high-pitched whistle. Never have I seen such a beautiful thing.

How long I linger at the shop I do not know; I barely feel the time progressing as I practice with sword after sword, dancing and whipping and twirling and the blades flickering and glinting and whispering as they whip and fly gracefully through the air with a kind of deadly boldness. There are long ones that shimmer and bend and flick in my hand like beams of light, and there are short ones that strike with furious and controlled movements, like powerful and stubby lightning strikes that tingle all over with raw energy. And every one of them is breathtaking in its grace and beauty. For all the while, all I can hear is the flustered exhilaration of my ragged breaths and the whisperings and hisses of the blades as I flick and twist and slash them across the air. Some are made for older boys than I, so some feel a bit heavy or a bit too light-some are even too fancy or too long or so short that they remind me of my old dagger, embedded in the stomach of the bloody-eyed Brit. And somehow I can't go back to that moment, not ever again.

I sigh, heaving a particularly shiny blade into the dirt floor with a dull thud and brushing some stray hairs back from my face, plopping to the ground and casting my gaze helplessly around the small room. I would have never guessed how hard this would be. Then suddenly my eyes fall upon yet another sword; it's propped up crookedly against the wall and its blade is dull and curved a bit at the tip, its hilt a deep black color. I hadn't even noticed it before. But now, there is something intriguing about its subtle simplicity, so I pull myself to my knees and seize the midnight-dark hilt-and instantly I know that I've found it. The way it fits so snugly into my palm, the supreme control I have over the curved blade as I slice it down through the air, the ring of it as I whip it in a skilled arc. Never could I ever find another one like this.

And so I creep stealthily from the shop with three objects bound to my belt: the compass, the pistol, and my brand-new sword. My bead strings thump against my forehead as I dash and leap back across the roofs, winding my way back towards the beach and my dad's _Crest_. The sun beats down above me, and under its heat, part of me feels whole and new, the strands of my long hair flying as I soar through the air. But the fury is still there, like ice inside of me, and I still cannot seem to let it slip. My fingers brush the trigger of the pistol and I swallow back my tears, panting and sprinting for the horizon.


	15. The Rules of Victory

_The Rules of Victory_

And so it begins. Day after day of bone shattering sword-fight training. Dad and I circle round the deck of the Crest, banging away at each other and the clash of the blades echoing over the normal chatter of the crew and the rush of the surf. I end every day bruised and so tired that I could drop dead upon the floor, the stars in my eyes and my whole body aching something horrible. Often I catch a glimpse of Smith out of the corner of my eye, watching me as he slowly and carefully slops his muddied mop over the planks of the deck. This single second of distraction usually sends me spinning to the ground, my sword clattering and my head throbbing; my father stands triumphantly over me, smiling his rough smile and leaning confidently on his blade.

"Rule number one of the sword, Jack: never follow the rules. A clever pirate uses his wit, his daring, and his resources in order to defeat his enemies; the only restrictions are what be physically possible and what isn't. Do whatever it takes to triumph, son, or I can assure you that ye will be beaten. Trust me; for ye, they will have no mercy."

I just stare up at him and he suddenly seizes my sore upper arm, dragging me to my feet and shoving my sword back into my hands.

"Hop to it, boy; on yer guard!"

And with a cry he is slashing at me again; with shaking arms I struggle to block him, sweat breaking on my reddened forehead. What a fighter he is, and again I find myself splayed oddly across the deck, my vision tilting and my fingers numb from a hard blow that I had been barely able to hold off. What a warrior my father is, and as I stare up blankly into the dizzying heights of the sky, I wonder why-ever he was never successful.


	16. The Silver Blade and I

_The Silver Blade and I_

I sit in the black of the storage hull, sealed off from the world, the flitting darkness sliding over me and the hilt of my sword clutched tightly in my fist, so tight that my palm burns and smarts. The splintery wooden planks are cool and wet through the fabric of my pants and the air I suck through my mouth is dripping with the taste of sludge and salt. The floor rolls sickeningly back and forth under my hopeless gaze: it is black like the abyss of the Edge and it smells of such a stench-a stench that fills my mouth with nauseatingly acidic liquid that bites at my throat and lays itself heavily on my tongue. I can feel the darkness, settling itself craftily around me and entwining itself forcefully about me-but as it crawls over my widened eyes and wrenches itself down my throat, all I can do is sit, staring into nothingness, like a shattered mirror. I can not bring myself to care. Not after what he said.

I tell myself to let it go. Repeatedly-so many times that I want to seize the words and hurtle them out of my head and into the abyss. Rotten little things they are. But somehow I cannot…my mind refuses to clear and find myself cursing everything under the sun. I hate those stupid winds and I hate those stupid Santiago townsfolk and I hate this blackness and I hate the British….I hate Daniel, and those things he said. Anger seethes and boils under my skin and my sword trembles in my shaking grip, my teeth biting my tongue so hard that my mouth fills with the rusty, burning, salty taste of my own blood. He is the spawn of Satan. He is a mutually twisted soul bent on my destruction. He is a reincarnation of all things evil. I regret that I had not shot him the moment he had turned to flee.

My eyes burning, I squeeze them shut and throw my arms round my knees, my blade biting my thigh as I rock to and fro on my heels. I don't mind the pain. I don't care anymore. Nothing really matters-nothing except him, and those icy things he said. His sneering image fills my mind and then I snap-the revulsion exploding in my veins and my muscles trembling with the pure, deadly bloodlust. Before I can tell what's happening I'm flying to my feet, the sword slashing in a silver blur that slices and splits the darkness like flesh, cries of shrill agony spilling from my lips. Shadows fly and I'm screeching and the sword whips through the air like the stinging wind of a tropical typhoon. The black scatters about me and then I cringe, the blade clattering loudly to the ground, the sea howling and the _Crest_ groaning under my feet. A slash of fire writhes across my thigh; shaking and my body prickling with sweat, I look down and see the dark black stain blotting on my leg, warm wetness trickling down my skin and the scent of blood filling the air. My breath heaving, I sag to the floor, where I sit amidst my own wounds, my head spinning and the world tilting. What a fool I am.

There are locks of my own hair scattered across the wetness; my heart wrenches as I realize that I must have sliced them free by accident. Mum would shame me. I shame me. My fingers shaking and my lip trembling, I bend and scoop the locks into my scarred palms, staring long and hard at them with bitter eyes. Foolish. And then with a long, shaking sigh, I close my fist and pull myself to my feet, drifting. I float as I ascend from the darkness, my heels clacking on the steps and the rush of the salty sea breeze stinging against the gaping gash on my thigh.

The rising morning sun smiles down upon me, but I do not smile back. It hangs in the lightening sky of dawn, its warming light spilling across the blue of the waves where it sparkles like fireflies on their crests. I stand still by the railing, gazing out over it all, the severed locks of my hair still clutched in my palm, my eyes unrelenting. The misty sea breeze sweeps through my hair and whips through my clothes, blowing a few more stray hairs free and sending them swirling away, tickling my cheeks as they spin. The familiar creak of Tanner's footsteps up in the crow's nest greets my ears-he is upholding his night watch, but he will not notice. I lean out over the waves until I see nothing but their foaming crash, smell nothing but their salty, moist breath, and feel nothing but their spraying spittle licking my skin and the spin of my head as I am thrust up and down, rolling and cascading and sloshing back down again. And that's when I let go, the entire ocean spinning about me as I tumble into its foaming, gasping cradle, my eyes squinted and the whisper of the world in my ears. My breath leaves me as I smack down, the sting of the impact ripping through my body and the current wrenching my sweaty palm wide open as I am drenched in living, breathing, icy cold. I am washed and tumbled and my mouth fills with salt water, the locks of my hair whisked from my grasp and consumed by the sea.

I am barely able to pull myself across the waves to grasp the port side of the _Crest_ with my trembling fingers, my entire body quaking with the wet freeze, my lips blue. My breaths shuddering and my lungs burning, I clutch to the wood and feel the swirl of the water around me, pulling me, numbing the twinge that threatens to split my wounded thigh. Somehow I deserve it, so I squeeze my eyes shut and breathe. And the ocean roars about me.


	17. Mum's Trinket

_Mum's Trinket_

A wave of fire stings across my cheek and my head is thrown to the side as her hand cracks and slices through the air like a whip.

"You…!"

She lets out a desperate cry, her hand still poised for another blow, the tears leaking, her eyeliner bleeding, and her ruby-red lips trembling as the sobs wrack her body. My face burning from the force of her slap, I turn my head and stare back at her, my body dripping with seawater and shuddering from the cold of the ocean, the velvet of the sofa scratchy against my legs. Mum's face is reddened and shining, her locks of rolling dark hair mussed and windblown. She whips back around to face me, her eyes alight with rage and glistening with tears, her lips pressed tightly together; when she speaks, her voice is spat out of her mouth like lashes from a blade.

"How_ could _you….? How could you do something like this; my _own_ little boy-oh, I thought you would drown for sure; jumping off of the side of the…the boat! Why; _tell me why_!"

"I…"

"**WHY**? My god; they barely managed to drag your sorry _hide _out the water before you sunk from exhaustion! If I had seen, I would have…"

"Mummy; Mum I'm sorry! I didn't mean to-it was an accident! I only fell, Mum!"

Tears are prickling my eyes but I restrain them. I cannot cry anymore. My gazes locks with Mum's, my arms clutched about my shivering, soaking wet body. Every word I'm speaking is a lie, but I don't care; I yearn for her to look upon me with her love, to hold me in her arms even though I hate when she does. She cannot know that I had myself chosen to take the foolhardy plunge.

The icy cold racks my body and my teeth chatter, my blue fingers digging into the soggy sleeves of my long, baggy white shirt.

"I only fell over the rail; the ship was rocking and I was leaning too far and…"

Her eyes bore coldly and distantly into mine and I grimace; for a second I'm expecting to take another blow, to feel the sting of another slap across my cheek, but nothing comes. For a heavy moment, all is silent except for the creak of the _Crest_, the shouts of the crew and the roll of the morning surf, the very same surf that had nearly dragged me down into the crushing cold of its frigid black depths. I had not taken the swirling riptide into account when I had let go, not until I had been swept into the churning waters of its mighty grasp.

Now, as I sit drenched and shivering on the sofa in Mum's den, I feel as if the torrent of freezing water has washed part of me away, something weighty, something light, something that I cannot lay my finger upon. My braids are undone and my face is bare and naked, all traces of makeup swept away by the glacial rush of the dawn-brewing sea. Mum stares frostily at me and I have no cover under which to hide; I am but a reckless boy gazing helplessly under the fire of her rage. She can sense that something is amiss; her intense eyes fall upon the sheared lock of my hair and her lips part in indignation, still saying nothing. But then the ice is shattered.

The next moment, she has entwined herself about me, wrapping me securely in the warm folds of her tender embrace, the trickle of her hot tears oddly comforting against my numbed cheeks. She smells of rum and strong perfume and the lofty breath of scented candles, and the aroma of her fills my lungs like air; I close my eyes and she kisses my forehead, stroking my loose, tousled hair with her dainty, heavily bejeweled fingers, her many rings glittering in the flickering, golden candlelight that thaws the biting morning chill with its sugary warmth. I feel her delicate hand lifting my chin and my eyelids flutter open; her face glows in front of me, a weary smile struggling to light through the wetness of her flowing tears. She holds her cupped hand out to me, and in her soft palm there sits a sort of a small, flat ornament. It is not a gem but it is not a stone, and it is of the most radiant blue hue I can imagine: it is like the cobalt wash of the twilit sky or the brilliant cerulean of the ocean on a midsummer's day. I can only stare at it glimmering in the low light; it is as if she holds the entire realm of the sea and sky, all in the single drop that sits so mesmerizingly in her hand.

Before I can utter a word, she knots the charm into my dark, dripping locks, grinning jadedly through her tears. What I have done to deserve this, I do not know. I simply stare speechlessly at her, my mouth hanging open and a drop of all of the heavens and the ocean glittering in my hair. She plants one last wet kiss on my cheek and then she vanishes, leaving me drifting in a daze of candlelight and sea spray and the breaking of the dawn.

I never wear eyeliner again. When night creeps its chilling fingers over the span of the sky, I retreat into the depths of the _Crest_ and later reemerge as someone new, my hair flowing in dark twists and my eyes framed with a black marking like smoke, to keep the blinking, shining light reflections from dazzling off of the waves and blinding me. The drop of the sea shines with me as I step into the light. Dad takes no notice, and I take no notice of him either. Instead I stare out over the ocean, listening.


	18. For When You Want to Disappear

_For When You Want to Disappear _

"My god…"

"Hmmmm?"

"It's just… it's simply uncanny, boy…"

Smith's voice is colored with disbelief, and his grin is one of delighted incredulity. My eyebrows slightly raised, I swivel round to look curiously at him, pulling my newly repaired shirt down over my head and straightening the cuffs-a swift swipe from my father's flying blade had torn it down the front so badly that Mum had gone through the trouble to sew it back into one piece.

"What is it that's so 'uncanny', Smithy? That I haven't killed myself yet?"

He chuckles and his graphite eyes sparkle in the silvery moonlight.

"Yes…**that** and….just how much you've grown up since I first laid eyes on you, Jack. Why, look at you; I'd shame myself if I had the heart to call you 'Little Sparrow' again!"

I look down at myself, a bit dazed at this comment. I most certainly don't feel any different. My mouth moves wordlessly, the _Crest _groaning beneath me and the rushing breaths of the waves drifting by and the warm, tropical midnight breeze. The Great Bear twinkles in the deep, velvet heavens like Mum's diamond brooch; the whole night is crisp and clear and dazzlingly beautiful. I cannot find the words to speak, so I stand silently and feel the touch of the wind as it whispers through my hair and rustles the fabric of my old, tattered shirt, the one I've worn since I was eight years old. It wasn't all that long ago. My father doesn't like to track my birthdays, (since he hates that day) but I believe that now I've seen ten years pass, like the steady roll of the breaking waves or the stream of the blessed trade winds billowing in our sails and carrying us along as we wander. It doesn't much matter to me. I just smile helplessly at Smith and pretend that I know what to think, my eyes sliding back over the black, silver crested waves, their breath hushing and hissing as the bow of the Crest splits them open into flying spray that catches the moonlight like spilled handfuls of jewels.

"You know?"

Smith's soft voice breaks the silence and I glance back over my shoulder at him.

"Aye; what?"

"My name; I've lied to you since the day I met you. I've lied to everyone."

I can only stare, my mind frozen.

"What do you mean…?"

"…That I'm a dirty liar, Sparrow."

He's smiling in that way that makes him look like the wisest man on the earth. I frown.

"You mean that your name…it isn't-it's not 'Smith'?"

He shakes his head, his silvery hair shimmering and his eyes alight.

"That's an old false name, boy. Fools nearly everyone. 'Smith' is such an old common name that no man will give it a second thought."

My mind is reeling-I'm not believing what I'm hearing.

"But…but, why? Why would you ever want to hide your…?"

"Security. It's just so no one will find me; can't track me down when my name is extinct. It's a great trick, lad… for when you want to disappear."

He stares out over the ocean and I wonder what he could have done to want to vanish and not to be ever found. And then I realize that there is so much about him that is still kept a secret; I'll probably never truly know him. I swallow hard, the distant stars twinkling in my wide eyes-something about this sets my heart a flutter. I want to talk, and I want to learn. I've known this old man for three years and I don't even know his real name.

Just as my lips part, the man slides his good arm round my shoulders, the calm smile still painted on his crinkled, scarred face.

"You figured out where that compass is pointing ye, Jack?"

I do not answer and he sees straight through me.

"I thought not. Tell you what, lad; one day, you follow that arrow and you'll find something amazing. And that's when you will find out."

I can only stare, my mouth hanging open, my hands absentmindedly fingering the compass tied to my belt. I could never be rid of it now.


	19. Ring

_Ring_

She has eyes like the dew that twinkles on the railing on a misty morning, and I feel them following me as I dash away through the brush, my shirt sticking to my back and sounds of the twilit everglade twittering in my ears. My dry breath is stuck in my throat and I can feel my heart pounding in my head as my feet sloshing through the wet whispering grasses, desperately shoving aside the leafy branches that threaten to snap against my skin.

I do not know her name. I had spotted her wandering about the barnacled dockside when the Crest had made port, the wind in the sails and the clear, sparkling aquamarine waves lapping up against the sandy coast, infested with the mossy roots of the coastal marshland trees. Isla Trinidad is a tiny little island that we pirates stop by in order to stock up on our provisions; the port of Isla Trinidad is located at the foot of small little village nestled in the sunny, sticky estuary of the tropical Caribbean. The ramshackle hut-like buildings of the Trinidad village stand up on moss-covered, wooden posts that keep them elevated above the still, green waters of the grassy, estuary. Many native islanders make their living here, selling spices and foods and drink and fine clothes to the sailors that drift by; their skin is as dark as the earth that lies buried under the heaps of tangled foliage and they speak in a harsh, native tongue. The glimmer-eyed girl does not look like the rest, with her flying braided hair like fire, her creamy skin as white as tropical sands, and her icy eyes that flicker like the waves. She had caught my eye as I had swung from a rope down onto the deck, and she has been plodding at my tail ever since, following like a faithful puppy, something alight in her brilliant eyes, something odd that wrenches my stomach. They muffle her determinedly splashing footsteps, the chorus of the chirruping insects and the frogs, the distant rush of the surf, and the blink of the drifting, star-like fireflies. Even the gasp of my own panicked breathing and my own sloshing tread conceal her advance, yet I know that she approaches still, bold as brass, the fire in her gaze.

I do not know why she follows so far without pausing. I have scaled swampy hills and swam through boggy lakes and tramped through the mess of thick, buggy undergrowth, and yet aft of me she remains. Maybe she wants something, maybe she only comes to frighten me, or maybe she yearns to strike me dead upon the soil with a concealed blade. My own sword thumps against my thighs as I leap over a crawling tree root, slowly snaking my way back towards the Trinidad Village, hoping to dart and weave and loose her amongst the gossiping crowds. Fear bogs my mind and my boots are caked with mud; I bat away a buzzing gnat and melt away into the bushes, wincing every time my footsteps slide noisily in the marshy muck.

Suddenly another noise catches my ear and I freeze, petrified; it is an invasive, crunching sound, and it seems to be but a few mere meters aft of where I stand. Something bursts from the bushes as a scream leaks from my chapped lips; I whirl around and my shaking fingers close around the hilt of my sword, quickly drawing the silvery blade and slashing it defensively about me, my panic blossoming like a choking vine. There she stands in front of me, her flaming hair flowing like liquid fire and her glittery eyes wide, her soiled, plain grey dress swirling about her knobby ankles, her bare feet muddied and dripping. She stares into my eyes and I feel my arms trembling, words unable to form. The silence hangs over us like a blanket, the swamp serenading the encroaching darkness and the distant seawater rushing in and out.

"Why do you run so, stranger?"

The girl's voice is strong and clear, like the crystal ring of the silver bell of the _Crest_. My lips move wordlessly, my blade sliding in my grip; she takes a step towards me and I jump.

"I only wish to greet you; I'll do you no harm. Why do you run?"

Her pastel face is expressionless and softly shaded with the deep hues of the darkening sky, her eyes glistening as they look deeply into my own.

"I..wh…I just…"

She suddenly breaks into a radiant smile, a smile of understanding, her hands lifting to rest offhandedly upon her bony hips.

"I know-you're a pirate boy, aren't you? I thought t'was a pirate vessel I spotted at the docks this afternoon."

I can only stare, my sword hanging limply and uselessly by my side.

"Haven't never seen a girl your age, have you?"

I shake my head dumbly and she chuckles lightly.

"I thought not. Now have you a tongue, or are you incapable of speaking for yourself?"

I blink and she smiles, rolling her eyes knowingly.

"Listen here,"

She softly pads up to stand next to me, holding her muddied hand out to me in gesture of welcome. "Betsy; that's what I'm called."

She gazes thoughtfully at me for second; she stands just as tall as I. "What be your name, now, funny boy?"

"Jack Sparrow."

The words roll mechanically off of my tongue, for I am entranced, spellbound by this eccentric girl and her strange words. I follow along with her as she drifts back to the village, the fire twinkling in her eyes.

We swing from the roofs by the hoary starlight, Betsy's long braid flying like the embers in a blaze. After a slight slip I tumble head over heels and she laughs, grabbing my shoulder and yanking me upright. We stroll along by the silvery, moonlit waves as they roll and crash over the pearly white sand of the beach, speaking in low whispers that are drowned out by the roar of the sea. She has lived on Isla Trinidad for as long as she can remember, and she roams the streets alone, with naught but her shadow to walk alongside her. I suggest that perhaps her parents were swallowed by the sea and she was left upon the beach, washed ashore by the current. She smiles but it seems oddly empty; I touch her shoulder ever so slightly, for some reason that I cannot comprehend. Her eyes connect with mine in a flash of burning energy; before I can pull my fingers away she has caught my hand in her grasp, studying it, leaning over it. She pulls something from her pocket that shines in the night; I shudder but it is only a ring, a ring set with a deep violet stone. With a deep breath she slides it onto my finger, catching me with a smile that drains my breath away, her face inches from mine. I feel a sharp peck upon my cheek and then she is gone, melted into the night, dashing away into the tangled marshes with the fireflies and the darkness. I stand blankly on the beach, left with only a memory and a ring that glimmers on my finger like a dying coal. Stumbling blindly through the night, I slowly make my way back to the village and sink into the grass that surrounds the blazing bonfire, where the drunken crew frolics.

"Why, Jack; where've ye been all blasted day long?" asks Tanner blurredly, his face flushed from his drink. "I was beginnin' to think ye'd been burned away by the sun!"

I do not answer, for the flame reminds me of Betsy and her fiery braid. Never do I see her again.


	20. A Broken String

_A Broken String_

Stars explode in my head and I sprawl across the deck, my sword clattering to the ground. A sturdy arm grips my shoulder and roughly yanks me upright, darts of pain exploding in every acre of my bruised body.

"Get up, boy!" Father spats in his deep voice, seizing the hilt of my fallen blade and shoving it back into my shaking grip, his shadow looming over me and his mane of dark hair flying in the sea breeze. "When you fall you must immediately regain your form or else you will be crushed! Get up, fool, get up!"

I struggle to right myself for a moment and then there is a bright flash that splits the sky; I blindly throw my blade against it, my teeth gritted and the world tilting dizzily about me. Father heaves his weight against me and I reel, tumbling over backwards, my head crashing against the dewy wood of the railing, the rays of the morning sun splintering in my cracked vision, the sky burning above me and the sea churning underneath me, my compass hanging heavily against my burning skin. My lungs gasping and my face sticky with sweat, my smarting eyes catch a slash of silver flying at me, blinding me, darting towards my chest with the ferocity of an icy British bullet. My arms hang as heavy as lead and my head swims, groggy with the dull, burning ache; somehow, my fingers find the hilt of my blade and I fling it up with a cry-my sword and my father's clash with the deadly ringing of steel, the clang from the blow vibrating all throughout my body. Dad looks down upon me as I gasp in desperation; his eyes are as wide as moons in his dumbstruck face. He had not expected to receive a counter-attack. My fingers tremble as I stare back at him, my eyes squinted ferociously against the glare and my teeth gritted desperately. The fiery moment hangs suspended in midair, as if the sands of time have been somehow rigidly locked into place, unable to move, unable to carry on. My father's ferocious eyes burn into mine and mine into his, our crossed blades shining in the sunlight and the waves crying, the _Crest_ rocked about in their wake. The crew is caught in the time, watching, unable to look away. The frigid gaze of my father happens to fall upon the ring with the violet stone, the ring that glitters on my finger that is closed around the glimmering hilt of my sword. Revulsion and bewilderment washes over his face like the tide and then I am struck with opportunity.

In a sudden, I heave all of my weight against my father and he staggers; in his second of instability I roll out from under him and leap to my feet, my bead strings glittering in the sun as the wind rips through my long locks of dark hair. He spins round and takes a swing at me with a cry; I swiftly duck away from the blow, turning on my heel and darting out over the deck, shoving my way through the crowds of bedraggled crewmen who stand in clusters, watching us. I know that I cannot beat Father, not by force, not ever by brute strength. This thought rings through my mind as I dash up the steps, ascending up towards the wheel, my breath tearing at my lungs. I round the bend and sprint towards the helm when my father's deep yell rumbles the air and something whips past me, rippling the very air that surrounds me; suddenly I find myself tugged up against the wood of the foremast, pinned by my baggy, soiled sleeve, pierced through by the blade of my father, of the sword that he had thrown. His ragged breathing hisses across the wind and I struggle to jerk my arm free, panic bursting in my head like waves breaking upon a sandy beach. And I know that I cannot. And so I wrench myself around and thrust my foot at him, catching him in the stomach and sending him crumbling to the ground, winded. In that moment I gather up all of my strength and heave, my sleeve tearing free with a horrible shredding sound and my father panting as he scrambles back onto his feet. My mind reeling, I seize the hilt of his sword and wrest it from the wood of the foremast, turning and whipping it out against him along with mine own, the sea shining in my narrowed eyes. He stands still for a moment, stunned in the face of the dual blades; I drop my stance and leap back down upon the main deck, the heels of my feet smarting and tingling as they slam against the ground, the crewmen crying out in surprise. As I right myself, my eyes catch Smith's paled face as he gapes at me, his slim form shrouded by the rest of the disheveled crowd. I can only stare back, unsure as to what has stunned him so.

My heart leaps as my father's boots thud down onto the deck beside me, and I swivel and thrust my own sword into the belly of a nearby storage barrel, ashy clouds of gunpowder flying to the wind and piercing my father's razor-like gaze; he claws at his eyes and I take a swing at him, both of the swords glinting icily in my grasp. He just barely falls clear of the blow, staggering back against the deck, his eyes streaming and bloodshot and the ocean roaring. He struggles and I knock him back down to the floor, jabbing both swords at his heaving chest, the razor-blades glimmering something deadly and striking. He looks up bitterly at me and I struggle to breathe, my face scratched and flushed, my hair knotted and my sleeve ragged. I have taken this duel, my father has fallen to my blade, and I can scarcely believe it. By the look on his face, I doubt that he can believe it either. The deck is silent and the wind whispers in the sails, the waves crashing beneath us. I can feel the ice of my father's gaze as it pierces me, and I lose all of my words to the howling surf. And suddenly I cannot stand to be there.

My body shuddering, I drop my father's sword and swiftly depart as it clatters down upon the deck, the ring glittering on my finger. Something is lost, not won. I can hear it in my father's rumbling voice as he murmurs a song in the midst of the pressing night, the mournful twanging of his guitar-strings echoing dismally across the mist in the breeze. There is a sickening snap and he plays no more; his guitar moans painfully as he slams it down upon the deck, storming into his quarters to fetch a new string. I stare out over the rolling sea, my ring twinkling like a firefly and my mind wandering amongst the blackness. There is no Great Bear peering out above me, for the skies are cloaked by the wispy veil of the fog.


	21. Lost

_Lost_

Dad and I haven't spoken, not since that day when I knocked his sword free. I sit on the steps or look out at the sea or toil away under the hot sun, scrubbing the ruddy deck with my arms burning and my back drenched with sweat. My father walks proudly past me, shoves me, and I slide and hit the ground like a stone.

"Next time move when you're in my way, boy!" he barks, and I lay there in the slime, feeling the heat on me and the sea spray that blows cool against my face, the ship as it rolls gently underneath me. Smith seizes my upper arm and jerks me upright while Tanner laughs his gravely laugh; I just stand waveringly and stare after my father's receding form, his long hair billowing like the black cloud of a squall, the tied-in strings of tiny silver crosses glinting in the bright sunlight. I think of the compass on my belt loop and that night I spend dark hours huddled up against the railing and the veil of the frosty stars, my eyes fixed on that needle, that quivering needle that points out to where I cannot discern. Never have I yearned so, just to know where it is directing me. I do not know where to go. I don't know if I ever will.


	22. Marie and the Golden Coin

_Marie and the Golden Coin_

It is a fine morning, the daybreak glinting with light that splits the faded sky and spills over the waves, flickering against my eyes in tilting, glittering prisms that dazzle with such a striking luster. A luster like a blade, glinting in the sun. The morning looks the same as the one during which I found myself plummeting over the railing and into the icy clutches of the unforgiving sea. I slowly ascend the stairs and gaze out over the lightening deck, the morning breeze chilling against my grimy cheeks, plunging its icy fingers straight through the thin fabric of my clothes and striking my flesh. My body shudders from the cold and I fight it, standing still and resolutely while I look out over the misty horizon, the steely waves slowly thawing to a deep tropical blue as the sunlight washes grandly over them. Suddenly I find myself feeling minute, my mind reeling with the sudden expansion of the world and the sky sliding farther beyond me the longer I stare at it. My consciousness tumbling over the Edge and my heart pounding, I hurl my sights down into the sea where they are promptly swallowed up by the azure expanses of the vast, murky depths. The shore seems like nothing, as does the town that lies nestled against it: Trinidad, I believe it is called. Already I have forgotten what we have come here to accomplish.

The day is sweltering and muggy and we pull into the steamy, rain-forested port of Trinidad with my father barking out like a beached seal, his ruddy face shining. The deck bustles with chattering voices and frenetic footsteps and the singing of the sun-glazed surf that shatters upon the white beach and splashes into shimmering golden flecks that glimmer blindingly in the tropical heat. I feel the perspiration trickle down my scalp as I strain against the line, the rope searing against my palms as I struggle to bind it into place, to secure the billowing sails that we have wound up tight to their yards to sit while the _Crest _is docked at the port.

"Now, get this into your thick heads, all of ye scurvy buffoons!" Dad bellows, his mane of scraggy hair flying like something wild and free. "We're here to recruit these folks here in Trinidad, not to scare the bloody pulp out of all souls who dare to cross paths with us! Behave yourselves, lads!"

"And what if _they_ do not behave, Captain Sparrow?" Smith politely inquires, his eyes glinting and his voice barely audible over the din.

"Any man who falls behind is left behind; you know the Code!"

"Aye, sir."

Smith's sharp gaze connects with mine and I divert my eyes, clenching my jaw and knotting the line, yanking it taut with my callused fingers and ignoring its fiery burn. Skinner guffaws drunkenly beside me, his bony hand clutching my shoulder for support as he sways giddily to and fro, stray strands of my hair catching painfully in the crooks of his blackened, ragged nails. Irritation welling up in my gut, I jab him coldly in the stomach and he doubles over, wheezing but still grinning his blank grin. Muttering under my breath, I turn away only to freeze up at Skinner's touch as his sticky fingers catch hold of my ringed hand, his eyes glued to the violet gemstone as it glimmers deeply in the vibrant sunlight. Revulsion burns sourly inside of me and I shove him away, spinning on my heel and striding indifferently after the rest of the disembarking crew, the stench of Skinner's drunken breath still lingering sickeningly upon me.

I swing through the molten air and land flatly on my heels on the rotted wood of the unkempt dock, the sea rumbling along the beach and the townspeople chattering excitedly. The thick, tropical foliage creeps over every bit of this ramshackle township, from the deep green moss that grows deep in the ruts of the grungy stone walls to the vines that worm their way into the crevasses of every shabby hostelry. Trinidad is shrouded in the deep filtering shadows that fall from the thick, leafy canopy that obscures the sapphire sky like cloud cover on a dreary day. Dancing shafts of the bright sun trickle down through the tree tops like light-rain and play upon the forested floor. The grubby, tanned faces of the townsfolk gaze strangely at us as we straggle boisterously along the worn dirt roads, winding our way towards the most prominent tavern of the settlement: the Bayside Inn.

"That's where ye should head for if you're looking for fresh, enthusiastic lads: the nearest saloon." My father says with an air of confidence, extending his great hands and pushing open the lopsided doors with a dreadfully loud creaking noise. The interior is seductively shadowy and smells of the evils in the deepest holds of the _Crest; _clusters of giggling, flushed-faced men turn to gawk at us as we burst on through, and for a second there is a resounding silence that envelops us all. But then it shatters and the air explodes with the clamor of a thousand, shots ringing and merry jigs swooning and drinks fizzing and sloshing and glugging. I shove my way through the crowd and seat myself upon a sticky, splintered stool as the commotion of the tavern boils and simmers around me.

"Wanna drink, boy?" a server asks me thickly as he shunts his way through the crowds, his voice running slow like molasses and a knowing grin etched onto his scarred, wizened face, his features eerily shadowed by the darkness of the inn. The rusted tray in his hands clanks with the glass mugs that rest upon it.

"No." I answer.

"Suit yerself."

He clinks between a dark skinned man and another of his kin and slips out of sight, whistling to himself a cheerful tune. Sighing, I settle in my seat and watch the folk as they frolic in the dimly lit room about me. I catch a glimpse of Smith and his silvery hair, sitting at the bar and sipping calmly at a tankard of rum, his bright eyes illuminated by the low golden glow of the hanging oil lamps above him. Tanner is doing a sort of a giddy jig with a very tall blonde woman who sports a rose-colored dress whose silky fabric shines like a flower petal as she moves. Flanking the blonde woman is a girl about my age; every time I turn to look, I find her hazel-colored eyes fixed intently on mine. I feel the heat flush in my cheeks and turn away, wondering why I seem to catch the attention of these wandering girls. Running a hand through my tangled locks, I cast my gaze around the room until it lands heavily upon a certain boy, a boy with straw-colored hair. He is dressed in grubby clothes and his sea-green eyes are soft, glimmering like dew as he staggers through the crowd, laughing and throwing his hands into the air. Something about him seems a bit funny, and I find myself unable to break my gaze, at least until I feel a soft touch on my shoulder and swivel around in surprise.

"Why do you sit here looking like that?"

It is the hazel-eyed girl, standing but a breath away from me, her chocolaty curls bouncing delicately on her shoulders as she speaks in her simpering, whiny drawl. She searches me for a reply and my heart lurches, my mind spinning and attempting to piece the words together.

"Errm…Looking like what?"

She gestures uselessly for a moment and then she points a glimmering nail straight at me, right between my eyes.

"**That**. With that…with that funny look on your face."

"_What_ funny look?" I ask, grinning awkwardly. She looks down at me and I can tell that she remains unsatisfied, and yet she plops herself down comfortably onto the corner of my stool, her baby-blue skirt billowing impressively about her legs. She must be a wealthy girl, and the stench of her perfume brings tears to my eyes as she leans closer to me, her eyes glittering with the strangest of looks.

"What's your name?; I don't remember seeing you 'round here before."

"I'm Jack."

"Jack who?"

I sigh, inching mutely away from her.

"Jack Sparrow. My father just made port here for a bit; he's the captain of our ship."

She contemplates that for a moment and then scoots closer still; I can feel myself shivering with embarrassment.

"You're a pirate, aren't you?; your ship must be a grand one, Jack."

I nod shakily, diverting my eyes.

"I'd very much like to see it," she breathes, and my eyes widen.

"What-Now?"

"Well-I don't mean a fortnight from now!"

"A..aye…I suppose I could-"

"My name is Marie, by the way," she whispers, and I can feel the tickle of her breath on my ear. "Marie Smithens."

My head tilts dizzily and my senses whirl, Marie's perfume burning in my eyes. I cast my gaze away and I catch a glimmer in the pocket of her dress: it is a doubloon of some sort, winking temptingly at me in the light of the flickering lamps. I cannot recall the last time that I held a golden doubloon in the palm of my hand-and my mind suddenly clicks into gear. This girl seems silly enough. I promptly slide off of the stool and turn back towards Marie with the most graceful flourish I can manage.

"Well, what keeps us dawdling about? You've got to see the ship, now, haven't you? My dad even says that I'll be a captain one day."

A giggle bursts from her lips like a blossom and I grab hold of her delicate hand, pulling her ever so gently along as I slip through the crowds of the saloon and out of the creaking double doors, the bright sunlight dazzling after the sultry darkness of the Bayside Inn.

"Now it's a bit of a walk out to the docks but just you wait-the _Crest_ is the finest pirate ship a girl like you has ever laid her little eyes upon!"

Marie swoons, shuffling alongside me and clutching my fingers tightly in hers.

I manage to keep her occupied over the course of our hike, rambling off about frivolous things and looking her so deeply into the eyes that her cheeks begin to glow rosily and her own eyes twinkle like gemstones. The rush of the sea greets my ears and the docks come into view; I eagerly scramble towards them, pulling a breathless Marie alongside me.

"Oh-now where is this _Crest_ of yours? Oh…"

Marie's hazel eyes lock onto a small dinghy that bobs in the surf like a cork on the side of the dock opposite the _Crest_. "It's a bit small, isn't it?"

"No, no; that's just some fool's little dinghy-This here,"

I gesture towards the Crest. "_This_ is my ship."

Marie turns I hear her breath as it leaves her; a hand rises to her face as the imposing vessel stands impressively over the both of us.

"Jack- it's beautiful!"

"Why, thank ye, love."

My words sound as sugary as a sweet.

Marie giggles and throws her arms about my waist, burying her face into my chest and her auburn locks flying silkily in the breeze. I fight the rising heat and do my best to gawkily embrace the girl while I stealthily slide my be-ringed hand into the folds of her dress, searching and groping until my fingers close around the doubloon tucked away in her pocket. My eyes fixed carefully on the shimmering sea, I inch my hand about and silently drop the coin into my own pocket, after which I feel Marie's fingers close upon the gemstone ring. My gaze flashes up guiltily and finds Marie confusedly studying the little violet jewel, slowly tilting my hand to and fro so that the ring glimmers elegantly in the sun.

"Are you _married_, Jack?" she asks in astonishment, her eyes connecting meaningfully with my own.

"Oh-of course I'm not. I just…I only just found that ring on the beach one day. My mum says I'm too young to marry."

She breaks into a discomfited smile and I tactlessly return it, thinking only of the boy in the tavern and of the stolen coin hidden safely in my pocket. And as we tromp on back to the Bayside Inn, Marie daintily clutching my arm, I wonder what it is that I will purchase.


	23. The New Boy

_The New Boy_

"Hey-what'cha doing here?"

I look up, turning away from the rail, surprised upon hearing this new voice. It's bouncy and candid and like nothing I've heard before. My mouth drops when I see him: the boy with the straw hair and the eyes like dewdrops. The boy from the Bayside Inn. Clearing my throat, I straighten up and brush my hair from my face, the tropical breeze playing on my shoulder and the golden doubloon hanging heavily in my pocket. I brush the dust from my trousers and the boy eyes me oddly, the sea thundering and rocking the _Crest_ in its wake.

"I'm just-scouting out. Looking around. Just in case…in case something's coming here." I find myself gesturing uselessly out over the shining water, like a beached fish. "I…well, I didn't know that my father was going to…erm…recruit lads like us on his ship."

"Oh; he didn't really sign me up-it's my papa that works here now. His mates call him 'Lazy John'-It's 'cause all he ever does is cook!"

The boy smiles at the silly nickname and casts his glittering eyes down into the sea, the trade winds rustling through his neat, short haircut. He suddenly looks up again, grinning like the sun.

"Is your papa the _captain_?" he asks amazedly.

"Aye, he is."

The boy laughs, his eyes shimmering in such a bright way that I almost have to divert my gaze.

"That's loads better than my pop-he's been a cook for a long time. He likes to work in bars and grills-like the Bayside- so he can try to catch a pretty damsel's eye."

"And he has ever done that?"

"No-he's got no matter of luck, it seems."

He laughs again and this time I join in, our voices swallowed by the scream of the gulls soaring over the bay of Trinidad and by the great yawning gape of the ocean, roaring and slapping mightily against the tide-worn rocks.

"Has your father ever tried to, well…run out to the sea?-he** is **a pirate, isn't he?"

"He is. He just can't barely do a blasted thing on board a ship, what, with that bum leg of his."

"Oh."

I gaze out over the hazy horizon and turn back to find those great glistening eyes, staring right into me. I can't help it: I shudder, and the boy chuckles. Flustered, I indignantly attempt to regain myself when the boy gently pats my shoulder, grinning.

"It's all right-I'm just fooling with you is all."

"Well, that's all duckets for you, now, isn't it?"

"Come on; I didn't mean any harm. You just seem a bit…"

I look over my shoulder at him as he searches for words that won't seem to come.

"Now how exactly do I seem?"

"Yeesh; I dunno-just a little…I guess a little…_funny_…I suppose."

His voice dwindles as he speaks, like a dying gust of wind.

"'Funny'? That's the best you've got?"

He shrugs hopelessly and I let out a laugh, throwing my head back and letting the wind slap my head of hair.

"Well, I guess it's just that I haven't really seen any other boys-not very recently anyways. Dad doesn't like to take them into the crew, you see."

"Oh; yes, I see."

"But I guess you'll be here now, savvy?"

I try to stop myself but I can't seem to help it. I feel hopeful, something I haven't felt in many a fortnight.

"Yeah; I suppose. That is, if the captain likes my papa's cooking."

"I'm sure he will. We've haven't had a proper cook for a long time-we've been living on Mum's funny crumpets and the barrels of salted beef that we pick up at port. It's all awful, really. Sometimes I wish I could take those things and-"

"Wait; did you say your mum was on board, here?"

I swallow. I'm not supposed to tell anyone about that. But before I can speak up the boy cuts across me, impatiently.

"Oh; it's quite all right! I don't mind it all!"

I breathe, unclenching my fists.

"Now that's a relief-last time a man found out about that, he threw himself off of the peak of the mizzenmast, one night when we weren't paying attention. The sea swallowed him up and we never saw him again."

"Wow: now that's a sad shame. What was his name?"

"I don't rightfully know-he all just called him 'Sammy'. Wasn't his real name."

I think of Smith and my insides clench up, saying no more. The boy remains silent, his elbows propped up on the rail as he peers thoughtfully into the distance.

"Well…"

He turns to me and holds out his hand, smiling again. "My name is Alexander; what be yours, mate?"

I grasp his fingers and we shake.

"Jack," I say.


	24. Lines

_Lines_

It's the doldrums again, descending down upon us, thick and heavy and hot like a suffocating woolen blanket sitting nauseatingly in the sky. The sun blares at us as we drift aimlessly through the flat, tropical waters, not a breeze to be felt, nothing to gently lift my hair and caress my sticky skin when I lean over the railing and peer out at the promising world. The intensity of the bright-white light on the sea dazzles my eyes so I line them even more thickly with the black, smeared charcoal, blinking away the smarting tears as I do. The sails lie flat in the aggravating stillness. The crew sits, on edge, their restless voices carrying softly through the sagging, clammy air. My father barks at them and they scuttle like frightened crabs. As their footsteps echo through the bleakness, Alexander paces back and forth across a small patch of the deck, pausing to glance anxiously over his shoulder at the sea, his dew-drop eyes glimmering with a strange, empty look, the sunshine beating down on his shining blonde head. My father plops down beside the helm and leans dejectedly against the mizzenmast, his guitar tucked into his arms like a small, bundled baby. The pluck of his mournful notes and the croak of his gravelly voice strike something deep inside of me as the gloomy song floats by on the air, like a current. It is a sad time when Dad decides to engross himself in his playing. I brush stray hairs from my damp forehead and peer up into the blinding white sky, wondering what there is left for a drifter to live for when there is no wind to guide him.

"Why?-why aren't we moving, Jackie?"

Alexander has grown antsy and he won't quit chattering; he's obviously never been caught in the doldrums before.

"It's because there's no wind."

"What do you mean, 'no wind'?"

"I mean that there's _no wind_. Not even a lick of it, it seems. And please: don't call me 'Jackie'."

Alexander gives me a strange look and so I lean over to whisper in his ear.

"Only my _mum_ calls me that."

Alexander is about to reply when a familiar voice bellows out and my heart drops like a stone.

"_Jackie!_ Get your rear over here and grab the mop, boy-the deck looks as awful as the face of Satan!"

Dad. I grimace and Alexander laughs, the sun glinting off of his straw-like hair.

"All right; and sometimes my dad does it too…" I groan, rolling my eyes.

"**Now**, you wretched, four-legged scabbard!"

Muttering to myself, I turn from the rail and trudge over to the starboard side of the deck, sullenly seizing the muddied mop from the soiled bucket water and slapping it down onto the wood, clenching my teeth and scraping it violently against the stubborn grime. Swabbing the deck is a chore that I've done dozens and dozens of times-so many times in fact that as I scour, I yearn to fling the mop by the handle and watch it plummet down into the thirsty depths of the ocean, where it could never torment me again. But alas I feel the bore of my father's hard gaze on my back and I slam the mop into the sludge, ripping it back out and ramming it into the deck and scrubbing like hell itself is upon us. I know that if I fail to please the captain, hell _will _be upon us. Well, on **myself** anyways.

My shirt is soaked with perspiration and I feel the soft thump of the golden doubloon in my pocket as I scrub; we haven't again made port since leaving Trinidad, and so I haven't gotten the opportunity to spend it on some interesting artifact. I also sense the weight of the black compass, which remains hanging from my belt loop, heavy as a stone, which it might as well be. But I remember Smith's words on that one star-studded night and my heart seizes; I somehow cannot rid myself of it, and in my frustration I slam the mop as hard as I can, splattering the deck with the sludgy mess as the sun rains unrelentingly down.

The next thing I know, my head is spinning sideways and a fiery lash of pain is ripping across my sweat-dampened cheek. The world tilts dizzyingly and I swing my swimming head around in surprise, the mop handle shaking in my hands. My father stands as strong as stone, his jaw clenched and his rough hand raised, prepared to strike another blow, his eyes glinting as icy as sharpened blades. In a flash, my breath leaves me and I stand shaking, the mop clattering to the deck and my cheek throbbing, the salty wetness of hot blood pooling in my dry mouth. Wordlessly, I put my hand to my mouth as a burning drop leaks out from between my lips, the same moment in which dad turns resolutely and stalks off, his footsteps ringing in the stifling air, muttering violent words that lash out ruthlessly from under his heated breath. I cannot speak. I cannot move. I cannot even breathe. Dad has hit me; I can scarcely bring my mind around to believe it.

I cling to the railing with a handkerchief pressed up to my chapped lips, my shoulders shaking and Alexander standing firmly by my side, patting my shoulder and his eyes sparkling like emeralds in the sun. The oceans murmurs before me and my eyes prickle with tears that I desperately restrain, the slosh of the mop scraping along in the thick air. Smith has taken over the job and he swabs the deck one-handedly, shooting me sympathetic looks while my insides tremble like broken butterflies, swooping and flapping helplessly in the stream of a ferocious gale.

"I just…"

I sniff and Alexander squeezes my arm, his eyes widening like the sky.

"I just never thought he would do something like that; not ever, just not ever. I guess maybe he...and then when I…and then he just…"

"Hey, hey; it's all right," Alexander says hurriedly, looking meaningfully into my eyes, my fingers tightening upon the folds of the bloodied handkerchief that is rightfully his, which he had given to me out of pity, most likely. "I mean…you're ok, aren't you?"

"No. No I'm not; I'm not ok."

Emotion washes over me like the thundering surf over the beach, tears pooling in my eyes and my fingers clenching into rock-hard fists, the anger quivering deep inside of me. I feel a light pressure on my elbow and I turn like the tide, my body trembling and my bright eyes streaming, the handkerchief fluttering from my fingers and drifting down to be lost in the churning of the ocean.

"You know what I like to do when I'm not ok?"

A weak smile spreads over Alexander's face and he gently tugs at my arm, his eyes glittering brilliantly, like a pair of faceted gemstones.

"What?"

"It's something that my papa taught me, but he told me never to do it since he said it was a stupid thing to do…"

"What _is_ it?"

"Only the best thing…ever!" Alexander exclaims with a voice like the promise of the wind in the sails, tugging again at my arm, pulling me towards the mainmast and the ladder leading up to the crow's nest. "C'mon-I'll race you there!"

He turns with a sunny gleam and scrambles upwards into the heights of the spiraling sky; burning with curiosity, I swipe at my charcoal-blackened eyes and follow, gripping the rungs with my calloused palms and pulling myself up after him. We ascend to the pinnacle of the world and gaze on down, the thrill of the height dizzying in our bodies and our stomachs swooning at the grandness of it all, smiling and breaking into delighted laughter that spills from our mouths and goes streaming down into the flat air like a kind of strange rain.

"See: isn't this great, Jack?"

I'm still laughing and so his lips break into a triumphant grin.

"We haven't even got to the best part-here, grab this."

He thrusts a stray line into my hands and takes one for himself, wrapping his fingers securely about it and bracing himself over the edge of the nest, his dewy eyes scanning the stagnant tangle of the yards and masts and sails and pulleys and ropes, contemplating, calculating.

I cock my head a bit to the side, grinning.

"Now, just what on earth are you doing there, hmm?"

"I'm gonna jump, that's what," Alexander replies, his gaze still in flight as he scrutinizes his surroundings.

"Jump?"

"Yes, jump-scared a bit, are you?"

"Not at all-in fact, I'm going to go first, how about that?"

I want to let it all go, to be thrust into nothingness and to be yanked out again. I want to forget.

I hear Alexander begin to protest but I've already let go, plummeting fast and furious with the heat slicing me and the wind beating at me and the deck zooming up under me, yearning to swallow me whole. The line bites into my fingers and my stomach swoops; suddenly I am airborne, like a gull, like the wind, like the sails and the clouds that float far above. I whizz through a water-washed blur of the sea and the sky, all molten and swirling and bleeding into one another and tilting and whirling around me. I am the sky and the wind and the birds that ride the gusts like ships on the waves, and I cannot hold it in any longer: a flying cry of ecstasy bursts from my mouth and then I am free.


	25. What He Saw

_What He Saw_

I'm perching on a barrel, feeling the spray of the sea and the radiating warmth of the burning oil lamp overhead and the steady movements of the _Crest _as it rolls to and fro, riding the crashing waves. Those wonderful, wonderful waves; we'd all been overjoyed when the wind had returned, blowing and catching the canvas like the breath inside our lungs. The bliss had exploded inside of me like a keg of gunpowder, like the colorful burst of a firework on a dark night. I'd found myself leaping up into the air, the breeze swirling about me, blowing through my clothes to my skin, overcome with delight as the long-heavy air was stirred up at last. I hadn't thought about it. I hadn't worried. And that was when he'd seen.****

Now I sit frozen to the bone, my arms wrapped round my legs and the wind whipping through my hair, feeling the weight of the beads as they thump gently against my head. I rock back and forth on my heels, struggling to let the deep, strong gales push on through me and clear my muddled head. I am laced with guilt and despair that sits lazily upon me like a physical weight, and no matter how far I cast my thoughts to the flying wind, this awful discomfort will not lessen. ****

It had taken me a few seconds to notice, but when I did, the terror had burst in my head like fire and I had yanked my windblown shirt down as far as it could go-but I'd grown a bit. My old, torn top was too short, and my breath had caught painfully in my throat as the brittle string binding my compass to my belt had snapped free, the small black case glinting like a sodden stone as it had bounced sickeningly along the wood of the deck. Without a second thought, I'd thrown myself to the ground and seized the compass between my fingers, shielding it from sight with my own shaking body, my chest heaving in horror and my eyes spread as wide as the sea. I could barely feel the stinging pain smarting in my scraped elbows and knees; I'd blindly slipped the compass into my pocket where it had clanked against the metal of the stolen doubloon, the relief spilling over me like the chilling cool of the tide. It had appeared that not a soul had taken notice of my foolish plight, but when I cast my eyes thankfully upward, they landed upon a familiar, dumbstruck, figure; it was Alexander, gazing down over me, his dewy eyes gaping as wide as his mouth in his petrified state of bamboozlement.

He'd given me an odd look as I'd gasped and clasped my bloodied fingers over the slits of my pockets, my hair mussed and my eyes dripping with desperation. I'd have done anything.

"P…please don't tell anyone-you've got to! Please, Alex!"

He had dumbly shaken his shining mop of straw hair, his eyes glimmering in the fading afternoon sunshine.

"Don't t..tell….Don't tell anyone _what_?"

My mouth had trembled wordlessly, my fingers shaking over my pocket and the treasures hidden within. I could not dream of telling him. I'd promised Smith that I'd keep it all a secret and that no one would ever know of it. Just the two of us.

I'd found myself turning away from Alexander and rising painfully to my feet, striding along with the wind, fleeing with something horrible looming like a shadow behind me and with something even worse burning like a bonfire within me. Alexander's hands had grasped my shoulders and tears had prickled my eyes, the world blurring and splitting and whirling into nothing.

I'd sniffed, biting my lip and remaining silent and guilty as Alexander's fingers had gently groped into my pocket and pulled out the compass, his sparkling eyes widening like the sky as he turned it around and around in his grasp. And there it had sat in his palm, dark as the night and yet as radiant as the sun. I'd shivered and turned away, clenching my bruised fingers into aching, bloody fists.

"Jack…..What is it?"

His voice had been as faint as the distant whisper of the surf, carrying gently along on the billowing gusts of the wind. He had looked up at me, brimming over with wonder, and I was exposed, cold and dazed. I had nothing left to lose. And so I had spoken, my voice choked over and my body shaking and strewn about like a dinghy torn and thrashed by the pounding of a howling maelstrom.

"A…compass."

Alexander had flipped its lid with his thumb and peered expectedly at its face as the needle darted about, swiveling and coming to a quivering rest in the direction of the stairway, the shadowy stairway that lead down below deck, down to our cramped sleeping quarters. His mouth had twisted in his confusion and I had swiped the compass from his grasp, wrapping it in my fingers and tucking it back into my pocket, still saying nothing as the silence had draped itself around us.

"It's…it's broken, isn't it?" Alexander had said, his voice colored with disappointment.

"No…no it isn't."

His eyes had fallen yearningly upon the small lump in my pocket, and I could nearly feel the burning of his curiosity.

"Where does the thing point-it's most definitely _not_ north…"

"I don't know."

Silence.

"Alex-look, you can't tell anybody about this, savvy? All right?-nobody."

"Why?"

"I…." I had taken a deep breath. "I'd promised to keep it a secret."

He'd looked me up and down, something cool and calculating spinning within him.

"Who gave it to you?"

"Somebody."

He had shot me an unsatisfied look and I had shrugged.

"Jack-why does it matter so much?"

"Stupid, it doesn't…"

"Yes it does. I can tell; I can see it right there. What say you?-It's just an old, broken compass, I don't see why…"

"Not broken, I told you already."

"What is it, then?"

I had drawn in another deep breath, inhaling the sea and the sky and the light dancing in the air.

"Special."

He had raised an eyebrow and I had rubbed my bloodied fingers carefully over my pockets, dismissingly. ****

Now he wanders about the deck as if he holds the key to world in the palm of his hand and I sit here on this barrel with a heavy heart, my mind spinning out over the ocean where I can't call it back. Later, as I swing from the heights of the crow's nest and swirl and soar out through the air like a gust of wind, the line burning under my curled fingers, I still cannot seem to call it all back. Something I have lost, and this feeling I cannot shake free. The warmth of Alexander's laughter blends into the blur of sound that washes over the air like the waves; my watering eyes catch darting glimpses of his shining blonde head as he twists and circles about the heights of the mizzenmast like a gull in flight. My compass thumps against my thigh and my heart swoops. I yearn to hold that black case in my hands and never let it go.


	26. To Where I am Directed

_To Where I am Directed _

The salt-tinged air presses down on me and my stomach churns, the_ Crest _bucking under my feet like a disgruntled steed; my head spinning and my temples throbbing, I sink down onto my cot and attempt to steady my mind as the cloth bunk swings to and fro with nauseating irregularity, the gasping waves thundering with all the strength of British navy. I do not know what to do.

I have spent many an hour staring out over the sterling-gray sea, watching the crashing, ice-white crests crack into spitting foam on the bow of the ship as we plow on along on the backs of the restless waves, Alexander laughing by my side. We speak of all sorts of things, him and I: of the funny way that Alex's father whistles and dances as he stews simmering pots of broiled potatoes, of reasons as to why the sky is such a bright shade of blue, of the frightening deepness of my father's bellowing voice, of the treasures buried in the deepest clutches of the ocean…..But Alexander remains curious, and no matter how I aim discourage him, he will not release his grip. He hangs onto the subject like a thirsty gull, and although I frown and turn away and tug at his strings with my ambiguous replies, he cannot seem to be stopped, not by the wind or by the driving rain or by the threat of the incoming squall, the one that so vexes Captain Sparrow.

"Your compass, Jack-what about that compass?"

And it goes on.

"Where does it come from; who was it that gave it to you?"

"Someone."

"To where does it point?"

"Somewhere important, I hope."

"Why don't you rid yourself of the thing?"

I shrug, casting my gaze out over the boiling surf, the dank sky above a murky shade of dull grey, darkened by the vast masses of gloom that swirl and gather in the farthest reaches of our vision. It is endlessly black on the horizon, and our path is awash with this aura of foreboding, this mighty gathering of malevolence. The waves roar and crash dreadfully upon the bow of the _Crest_ with the devastating force of a thousand gales. The heated ocean howls at us, etched with a deadly silver and stretching out for as far as we can see.

Smith peers thoughtfully into the oncoming blackness with empty eyes, perched up at the pinnacle of the mainmast with the dismal sky at his back. Tanner paces doggedly about, repeatedly glancing over his shoulder and washing himself with drink after drink after drink. Skinner chuckles and peers down over the railing and into the fury of the turbulent sea, his fingers trembling as he is pelted by the ice-cold spray. Alexander shivers on the deck, huddling by the flickering light of the lit oil lamps, rubbing his fingers together in the faint glows of warmth, the terror sparking in his doe-eyes as he stares up helplessly into the strengthening uproar. The captain stands unyieldingly at the helm with his knuckles white on the wheel, his teeth gritted and his cloud of dark hair whipping in the wind as he steers us purposefully ahead. My stomach turning over, I sink dolefully into the depths of my tangled sheets, the cot rocking agitatedly beneath me and the roar of the wind and waves tearing into my ears. All I can think of is what my father hates with such an undying passion: the day of my own birth, the day of the worst tempest ever to strike the blue-green, sun-washed seas of the Caribbean.

I find myself staring miserably into the face of the black compass, my heavy eyes fixed desperately upon the little spinning needle as it trembles and strikes its finger decisively into the sliding shadows, pointing off deep into those far-off places, those uncharted places at the end of the world. To those places where I so yearn to go.

Pulling myself shakily upright, I snap the compass lid shut and drop to my feet, struggling to steady myself against the disorienting, groaning roll of the sea as I slip the little black case back inside my pocket and urgently throw my flitting gaze over my shoulder. My boots clack on the splintery wood as I treacherously ascend the gloomy stairway and struggle into the meager gray light of the rapidly darkening sky, my pattering footsteps dragging me through the billowing gusts and winding away towards the helm, where my father stands like a mast, strong and steely and towering high above my head.

"I have a heading, captain."

I find the sturdy words spilling out between my lips before I can reel them back, and I feel my bruised fingers digging stealthily into my pocket as I am pierced with my father's steely glare, as cold and striking as a speeding British bullet.

"Don't you push me now, boy," he spits, his eyes scanning me contemptuously. "Can't you see that we're headed straight into the mouth of hell? Unless ye know of the way to…to **Tortuga** through this goddamn mist of burden, then I suggest that you don't bother to flap your untried lips."

"Aye, I _do_ know of it."

He eyes me, clearly unconvinced, and I firmly jab my finger out into the dreary murk that clouds the distant horizon, taking a sly peek at my compass as my father's gaze flits out to where I point. I slide the black case away and the captain turns back to face me, his face lined with his suspicion.

"There is nothing out there, boy, I cease to notice why-"

I shake my head and gesture out in another direction, in the direction of the long-lost outlying places, in the direction in which the quivering needle points. It is far-away and awash with the light that spills feebly through the mass of cloud, and I feel giddy as my rising heart soars out over the waves and rushes away with the flying wind.

"Hard to starboard! Head out yonder and make it fast, ye foolhardy sea-slugs!"

The_ Crest_ swoons and groans as she splits the waves and cracks the sea into a shower of spray. I stand helplessly at the helm, bathed in my own bewilderment, as my father yanks furiously at the wheel, that furious look of steely determination etched onto his skin. Somehow, some-way, he is complying. He is heading out, out to that sun-kissed shore that lies so wretchedly far-away. The wetness rushes about me and I can only think of one thing: that we are headed away at last. I absentmindedly finger the compass in my pocket and give the sky a faint smile.


	27. Black and White

_Black and White_

I don't remember when it began. All I remember in my state of dreamlike disbelief is the muted uproar of the crew and the hysterical yelping of my father, his eyes glinting like steel and his teeth gnashing like some kind of foul sea-beast:

"Get down below and lay low with yer mum, you half-witted buffoon! Go; go and take that Alexander boy with you; go or you'll be washed into oblivion like some pathetic piece of rubbish-Go, boy, GO!"

I whirl about desperately and then I can move no more, for I find myself staring into the gaping black jaws of death itself. It is as if the ocean has split along the seams and has shattered into a many million fragments from the inside-out, releasing blindingly icy-white cascades of flying sea-water that take to the air with the screaming wind and drive themselves down upon us like a rain of freezing gunfire, a rain that slices deep into our skins and bites us with its pitiless frigid breath. The world screams with a million horror-struck voices as the bowels of the sea are ripped apart and thrust devastatingly upon the fragile, groaning body of the ship; I see nothing but black and white as I and whirl and thrash and tremble before the staggering awesomeness of this hell of a squall, my feet flying over my head and my mouth choked with salt and my skin burning with the lashing splinters of the sea's bitter frost.

A searing pain suddenly explodes in my temples and I find myself grinding agonizingly up against the drowning face of the splintery deck, my vision stinging and clouded with salt and my throat clogged with the writhing body of the sea, choking and unable to draw a clean breath in the midst of the tingling, water-drenched air. Tilting and spiraling and aching and feeling the hot burn of the blood as it wells up excruciatingly within the fiery gashes torn into my mercilessly thrashed cheeks, I desperately attempt to blink the water from my eyes and I tuck my mouth into the crook of my arm, hacking and gasping for air to quench the blinding fire smoldering inside of my searing, heaving chest. The flying water tears at me with greedy fingers and I frantically clutch at the sopping floorboards, blinded and screaming and struggling to breathe and yet not able to hear my own petrified voice amongst the mighty thundering of the horrendously aggravated ocean. As I spiral up and down and around and sideways in the rolling grip of the thrashing bone-bleached surf, I cling painfully to the wood of the Crest and realize how truly tiny the ship is-it is but a speck of wood and metal and canvas that floats like a twig upon the restless back of the mammoth beast of the sea. My fingers throb and the hot rivers of blood trickle down my chin and I feel as if the ocean could swallow me, for I am nothing but a mere bundle of horrified flesh and bone.

A sudden scream pierces me through the din and I swivel about in dismay, my mind struggling to whirl into action; a drowned flash of straw-yellow glints past me and I throw my fingers out blindly, for I know that it is Alexander that flounders in the thrashing grip of the thirsty surf, kicking and screeching and about to be swept from the ship in a thundering wall of icy white. There is a deafening roar and with a groan I am thrown violently off of the deck, smothered and tossed by waves of bone-dead whiteness. Somehow my aching hands keep their frozen grip; Alex and I are catapulted through the freezing, airless oblivion and with a painful crash, we slam down into the wood with all of the limitless fury of sea, stars winking in my spiraling head and the world slanting nauseatingly before me. I feel the ocean's icy fingers caressing my skin and gripping at my clothes with their chilling touch, but yet I cannot bring myself to move; my body is as immobile as marble and the excruciating pain is almost dulling, my stinging eyes too heavy to hold open for much longer. The smoky blackness encroaches and I do not have the strength or the will to fight it back; my mind is sinking into nothingness when there is a sudden jerk and then I am released, gasping and heaving and sucking down the precious air like a drowning man, my lungs burning and my torn skin afire.

"Oh Lord have _mercy_! Oh, you foolish, **foolish** little boy-you mad, insane excuse for a human being, you…!"

My ears catch the familiar sputtering and I struggle to see past the salt that blurs my weakened vision.

"Alex; get him up and I'll see what I can do…"

Something shoves itself painfully into my back and I am roughly thrust upright, grimy water running down my chin and the wonderful air spilling back into the depths of my parched lungs. I hack the last of the wetness from my throat and with a gasp I manage to pry my drooping eyelids apart, the howling of the sea still ringing loud and clear through the buffeting, wind-torn air.

I have been pulled in through the door of Mum's den, the darkness sliding about and her scented candles flickering and sliding with the waves as the Crest thrashes about in the wake of the storm. Crouching before me are Smith and Alexander, their sodden hair and clothes plastered to their dripping bodies and their faces bone-white as they stare at me with widened eyes, both of them breathless with blind dread. Mum lies motionless upon her sofa, flopping like a beached seal, her lips trembling silently and her gentle fingers twitching, passed out from pure disbelief.

"Oh, thank the Lord that you're all right, Little Sparrow," Smith says with a kind of winded elation, gripping my trembling shoulder with his good hand and pushing my sagging form further upright. "God, I could scarcely bear the thought of the water smothering ye to death, you foolish excuse for a pirate's son!"

I stare mutely at him, rivers of searing blood running down my cheeks, and his face suddenly hardens.

"What the _devil_ were you thinking, lad?; what, are you delusional enough to think that you're grown enough to withstand the might of these hellish tempests? Didn't you **hear** the captain tell you to get down below, out of harm's way?"

"I d..did-I just….I couldn't…I…"

I blink helplessly and my gaze connects with Alexander's, whose eyes immediately dart shyly away, his drenched body shuddering and his arms wrapped firmly about himself as he stares disbelievingly into nothingness. I can tell that never before has he faced death, and we both know that if I had not caught hold of him in the wake of the gulping waves, he would have been swallowed into the crushing depths of Davy Jones' locker, never again to catch even a glimpse of the golden light of day. He cannot speak and neither can I. No words surface but I can tell in his sparkling eyes that he is thankful, thankful beyond sentences. We huddle together, dripping with the blood of the sea, shivering and shaking and leaning on each other as the storm rages on into the blaring blackness.


	28. Red

_Red _

The last I know is the black swirl and the beaten shuddering of the _Crest_, something light and misty peering from the distance, from the edge of my blurred vision, slanting and smiling warmly down upon me. Alexander's eyes glisten and I fall into nothingness, losing my grip on the dripping, swiveling plane of the world and pitching dizzyingly into the overwhelming darkness, my head floating and my stomach sinking and my aching body scattered in a million directions at once. I don't know what to think. I'm not even sure of how to think anyhow.

The world suddenly rights itself beneath me and I find myself drifting like a lost bottle in the foam of the surf, beams of saintly light spilling down upon me and the very air glittering with the luster of all of the worldly treasures that lie at the ocean's floor, glinting up through the bed of wavering aquamarine. My gaze spirals gently and through the brilliance I spy something dark and protruding, something that pierces the whiteness with such elegance and pride that it brings the rush of tears to my eyes. What this thing is, I have no blasted clue. I glide and it towers far above me, a formless jewel, a black light casting long shadows that slide over me and cool me, comfort me. As high as I reach, my fingers cannot graze it, but somehow I know that it is mine. All completely mine. And this feeling I tearfully embrace.

The blackness sparkles in my eyes and suddenly this faraway world of light is shattered in a cold shower of reality. I snap awake to nauseatingly rolling dankness of the bilge and the evilness of all its festering odors, gasping and retching and struggling to pull myself up from the sludgy floor and up from my strange, sprawled position. The pressing shadows smother me and all is as black as the mouth of the Devil; my eyes darting blindly, I groan with agony and attempt to roll over, to grope at the walls, to fight my way up from the filthy wetness that sloshes foully round my ankles. But in a moment of horror I find that I cannot. I thrash about uselessly but I cannot even move. And it is because someone has bound me here. Horror of horrors.

Terror pounding at my temples, I struggle to suck in a deep, wavering breath and find that my mouth has been bound by some revolting soiled material, my hands strapped firmly above my head and my wrists burning from the roughness of the rope biting into my skin. I twist my sore fingers about vainly and then I realize that it's no use, the despair sinking sickeningly over my mind as the mucky, reeking bilge-water scuds sloppily against my chilled and battered body, light from the absence of the usual weight of my sword. I cannot free myself. I cannot cry for help. My heart lurches as I realize that the contents of my pockets are missing along with my blade and my pistol. The compass and the stolen doubloon are lost, and I find myself holding nothing at all. It strikes me like a knife, it does, and I sit soundlessly in the midst of my disbelief, my eyes widened like moons and yet still seeing nothing. Somehow, someway, I must lead others to find me, and maybe then I will stand a flicker of a chance at catching this traitorous scum and regaining my stolen property. But I cannot see a way. I cannot see anything but the never-ending blackness and for a second I am lost in the fog of hopelessness.

Suddenly, a realization hits my mind like the surf crashing against the rock and I find my wits clicking into high gear, my eyes darting sightlessly in the midst of the abyss as the deadening pressure of anguish is slowly alleviated. As revolting as it is, the bilge remains the storing-place for a number of my father's special rum-barrels, the ones that he refuses to let the rest of the crew discover; too rare, I guess. He keeps them precariously stacked up against the walls of the bilge and he does not bother to tie them down, for he fears that some foolish bloke will stumble upon his secret while he is in the process of concealing the evidence. The racket of these free rolling rum-barrels is a sound that a man will most definitely take notice of. And I waste no time.

Gathering myself together, I lurch and strain desperately against my bonds, stretching the tips of my unrestrained toes so that they poke out into the sea of blackness as I grope for the wooden sides of the stacked rum-barrels. Once I find the blighters, they will be stacked no more. My held breath spills from my lips as I feel something solid rub against my groping feet, my bound wrists burning as the taut cords chafe them raw. Groaning with the effort, I plant both legs against the stacked barrels and shove them with all of the vigor that I can muster, my thighs burning and hot beads of perspiration breaking out on my throbbing, dampened forehead. I pant and struggle feverishly, the dead weight of the barrels refusing to budge, standing as sturdy and stubborn as a massive pile of boulders-and stand they do until the mighty blow of a monster of a wave, a wave that throws itself against the _Crest_ and tilts and sets barrels tumbling, rolling and splashing and thudding back and forth upon the floor of the bilge. Water droplets spatter against my skin and the wooden barrels slam solidly against the bodies of the filthy walls; for a wild second, my head floats with the elation of my success. Then I hear an approaching scraping and sloshing and sudden terror pops into my mind; I blindly throw my weary legs out in front of me and struggle to catch the rolling barrel before it can crush itself against me, my muscles straining against the dull weight until the ship slants and the barrel tumbles away, leaving me breathless and aching. And that's when my ears catch voices, rough chattering voices that somehow sound over the din of the creaking ship, the thundering of the sea, the smashing of the barrels, and the muddy sloshing of the bilge-water.

"I swear it, mate, swear it upon me heart and me flesh and upon the soul of the Devil himself; I heard noises down around here, god-awful, monstrous noises!"

"Of course ye did, Petey. And me mum's a swordfish."

"No, no!; shut up, will ye-blasted fool! Now shut that bloody mouth of yers and open up them ears; I swear that ye'll hear it! See here, listen!"

They are silent for a hanging moment and a barrel splashes and slams but a few mere inches from my elbow; I had been so transfixed upon the voices that I had not noticed, and now a muffled yelp escapes my lips and I struggle to cringe away, my frantic breath hot against my scraped cheeks.

"Oh, slap me thrice and feed me to the governor-I heard someone, Johnny! See, listen, I heard him! The _sea demon_!"

"Pete, ye old fool-there ain't a soul down there 'cept for the evil stenches of the bilge; even a donkey knows that. My ears're better than yers-I'd have heard a man if he were there!"

"Well, John, yer as deaf as an old stooge! There's someone there-I heard his little voice, I did! Heard it over that hideous banging!"

"Oh, come now; there's nothin' down there but the rats. Oh fer goodness sake, c'mon, ye trembling piece of seaweed-c'mon and John'll show ye so's ye can see fer yerself."

There is a dry creak and a stream of flickering golden glow spills like liquid through an opening doorway, a doorway that stands about two metres left of me. I blink the light from my dazzled eyes as the two men stare dumbly about them, one of them (the taller one) clutching a rusty oil lamp in his grubby hand, the radiance illuminating the bowels of the bilge and glinting off of the dark pools of wet sludge. I grunt and whack my elbow desperately against the soiled wall in a desperate bid to catch their attention; their eyes widening, they turn, dumbstruck, the lamp throwing a shower of light over me as their gaping eyes connect with mine. A scream splits the air and the shorter man jumps up nigh a metre in the air while the taller one splashes numbly towards me, his lamplight quivering and wavering with the roughness of his gait.

"Mary, mother of God; Johnny-what on God's green earth…?" the shorter man sputters, swiveling and drunkenly trotting in the other's stead.

"Can it, Petey…" John says roughly, turning and drawing his blade in a scraping, glinting-gold flash. He cocks the glimmering sword to sever the bonds on my wrists when Pete cuts him off, scrambling up beside him, shocked to the core.

"Oi; ain't that the…the _captain's_ little boy?"

I shoot an impatient look at John and with a slash, the man slices my hands free; panting, I immediately rip the cloth from my mouth and struggle to my feet, thinking of nothing but of my compass in the filthy clutch of a thief. Strong, callused hands grip my shoulders and I stagger dizzily, John's watery eyes delving deep into mine own, concern sparkling in his gaze.

"Good god, lad; what on earth happened to ye? Nearly looks like ye've been dragged through hell and back again!"

"Look-that looks like blood there, all over that face of his…."

"Oi; have either of you seen someone around here, someone with my sword and my effects?" I blurt, the words leaking free before I can restrain them. "Please; anyone?"

The two men exchange blank gazes, and right from then on I know that they won't be of any further help. I'm desperate, spiraling, wavering; my head spinning and my body shaking, I shove desperately at John and wrest myself from his grasp, swiveling and dashing out through the light-filled doorway, the two men hollering after me and my muscles screaming in protest, my breath ragged and my steps pounding as I ascend the stairway and tromp out over the strangely deserted deck, the wind caressing my skin so gently that it could've been kissing me. So wonderful it feels, after the stench and the filth and the black slime of the bilge. Over the misty sea I spot a fog-laced shoreline, the shoreline to whence my compass had been pointing me for many a fortnight. _The compass_…

A sudden distressed movement alerts me and I swivel round in desperation; the frantic pattering of footsteps loops round the base of the mainmast and I throw myself on the trail, my legs carrying me on a sudden wave of exploding energy, the breeze whipping my hair and the fire on my wrists flaring up in a painful sear. The deck soars underneath me and the surf and the wind flare in my swimming ears. The thief holds what I cannot lose, what I will not lose. He will first have to kill me.

"I've got them, daddy; j…just like you said…Look, his sword and his money and everything…"

"Now it's about time, ain't it, boy? We can't get a livin' out of nowhere, son; now get that blithering behind of yours in the boat and we'll make like the wind 'fore a soul notices-hurry now!"

And I suddenly cannot take another step. I stand frozen. Stunned. Infuriated. Cheated. Lost. I'm swimming in agony and bewilderment and shock and disbelief, all mussed up into one swirling pool of a plethora of things, seeing the unimaginable and not believing what I am seeing. What a fool I am.

Clatter. A dozen of my effects crash to the deck and spill about in a jumbled mess. The boy before me turns like the tide, his dewy eyes as wide as the heavens and his straw-blonde hair playing in the dappled, filtered sunlight that leaks down weakly from the blanket of breaking storm-clouds that hang lazily overhead. Alexander's mouth drops open and his eyes catch a handful of sun and spray it out in such a strange way; it glints off of the stolen doubloon and off of the hilt of my sword, both of which lie glittering upon the deck. My pistol is stowed in his leather belt and my astonished eyes drift down to settle upon a small dark object, a very familiar object that sits bound just below the silvery buckle. The compass. And I cannot take it anymore.

Suddenly I find myself launching through the air, hurtling, screaming, twisting, kicking and punching and throwing myself at every inch of his body that I can reach, the black of the compass swinging so tantalizingly before me in the blur of my heated vision. A blow strikes the side of my head and I stagger and crumple exhaustedly to the ground, stars winking in my eyes and my temples throbbing something terrible, the grating of metal tearing into my ears and the glint of steel blinding my eyes. I find myself staring dumbly at the drawn point of my own sword, Alexander clutching the hilt in his own trembling hands, the frantic shouting of his father billowing threateningly over his shaking shoulder. His eyes prickled with tears and his pale cheeks are flushed, his teeth grinding anxiously into his chapped lips.

"Give it to me." I demand, my voice flat but true.

Alexander looks down at me, helpless.

"_Give it to me_!" I cry, my eyes awash with burning tears, wrenching myself up from the ground and driving the glare of my gaze deep into Alexander's, shouldering away his weakly-held blade and knocking it from his grasp with the dying ring of a fallen bell. He screams and falls against the railing as my hand flies ferociously for his belt, my desperate fingers clutching round the small black compass-case and the world sparking in my gaze. His spreading eyes fill my sights and his voice is the last thing I hear before a sharp crack, like the splitting of a mighty glacier, wrenches through the air and rips through my flesh, cold and clean and tearing a merciless path of searing agony, hot scarlet spitting into the air and my legs giving way once more; I gasp and slide to the floor, numbly clutching my arm which bleeds a shower of scalding, rusty wetness that seeps like fire through my fingers and drenches me. I am shot by the pistol of Alexander's father, who sits bolt upright in the loaded dinghy that floats alongside the starboard side of the _Crest_, the gun cocked in his hand and the coldness of death flashing in his eyes.

Alexander cries a rain of shining tears as the world tilts and slants dizzyingly before me, uprooting me and whirling me away into the heights of the violently pitching void. I faintly feel something pressed into my weakening hand and I spy the compass, sitting there like a jewel in my battered, grimy palm.

"Here, Jack-it's your compass; here, take it, all right? I didn't mean it; I swear I didn't mean it-this is just how my daddy and I get ourselves enough money to buy our bread and wine; please…..Please; I'm so sorry-this is wrong and I'm so sorry…I was going to…and I wanted to have it but then you saved me and I just…"

He sniffs and slides the sword and the pistol up next to me, bending down, slipping the compass into my pocket and looking right into my eyes with the brilliance of a thousand suns. His face is blanched and paved with shining tear tracks, his eyes twinkling with the sincerity of a million stars, of the glimmer on the dawn-lit sea, of the shine on the locks of a girl's plait. I want to speak, but all that comes forth is a pain-choked gasp, my paling fingers clutching helplessly at my wounded arm as the mess of crimson spills sickeningly forth, smelling of salt and rust and the rising heat of death.

Alex's fingers spread and hang poised in the air for a moment; there is a sudden flash of deadly silver and suddenly, all is gone from his shimmery eyes. Like a drain. Like the cruel December winds that steal away all precious warmth and thrust it away into the face of the frosted skies. Alexander still looks at me but his eyes are empty, like a shell, coated with a deadened blanket that steals anything and everything away. I don't understand, and I find my gaze drifting helplessly upward, following the blade of white-glinting steel that pierces so horribly through Alex's heaving chest and releases rivers upon rivers of washing red, redness that spills and pools and streams and burns and sends my head spiraling away into the yawning void. The last I see is my father's cold gaze, his fingers and his blade and the deck and my skin dripping with shade upon shade of this awful red. The red that stings my face and drips down my chest, scalding and trickling and burning.


	29. A Resolution

_A Resolution _

The _Crest_ is coming up on the light-bathed land but I can't bring myself to care anymore. My arm feels like it's stuck full of the water-darts that had shattered from the eye of the squall, and they burn and sting and drive themselves deeper and deeper into my flesh. The pain is so agonizing but now I cannot even feel it anymore; my deadened arm hangs lifeless and heavy at my side and I clutch at the slippery, frigid railing, my father ripping and tearing at the back of my shirt like a thirsty gale. His sword slashes like sunlit ice and he yells and bellows and drags me along backwards, the fabric of my shirt ripping free in his hands and the scent of blood assaulting my nose. The freeze of the ocean's breath bites deep into my exposed body and the captain is howling again, nigh as loud as the gulls that scream chillingly and circle gloomily overhead: he's yelling some nonsense about having to cut off my arm if we cannot attend to the gaping gunshot wound. I shudder and gasp and he seizes me in a grip like a vise, carting me off like a sack of stolen loot, tears pouring and stinging and dripping sickeningly down my aching, bloodied face.

I am rushed into the cool darkness down below and I struggle and thrash against the captain but I can barely even move; somewhere, in the back of my muddled mind, I know that however long I stand to fight, never will I see Alexander again. My stomach heaves as I'm shoved roughly down into a mess of tangled blankets, my father slashing at me and my body recoiling as I am hit ruthlessly by the searing, rusty odor of a fresh wave of newly spilt blood. My breath yanks at my lungs and the pressure winds itself round my wounded arm along with the folds of a long piece of soiled cloth, the captain binding and securing it firmly against the iciness my bare chest, the muffled blood-flow still burning fiery and ripe beneath the wraps of the fabric bandage. Dad's rough fingers swipe the blurred tears from my face and then they slap and tingle blindingly across my scraped cheeks, his face screwed up in fury and his voice lashing into me like a stream of thrashing storm-water.

"You fool, you stupid little fool; _pirates_ do not snivel and blubber like some common whores!"

"_Why did you__** kill **__him; why…how could you…?_"

He widens his eyes as if challenging me and so I venomously spit out that last word, the blood pooling and burning on my tongue.

"…_.Dad!_" I scream, my arm aching and my body shaking uncontrollably.

"_He_…that little scheming snot had been plotting against me and my good crew for all the weeks that he and his pestilent father landed their rotting carcasses aboard my ship. He and his…**father**; they hardly deserved to live. Traitors and mutineers hardly deserve to live; maybe one day ye'll be able to wrap that round that thick head of yours, boy."

I think of the compass dangling from my belt and my vision clots full of tears, tears that the captain smacks mercilessly from my swollen eyes with a stinging blow from his blood-stained hand.

"How many times must I tell ye, fool!; a pirate does not bawl!"

I lay there shaking feebly, my throat choked off and thoughts of the impossible spiraling to and fro in the tide of my head. It hits me like a breaking wave, like a ripping gunshot or like the blow of a battle-hardened fist: Alexander is gone, dead, lost to the great beyond. Never again will I see his eyes glitter like a pair of diamonds in the sun. Never again will I hear the joy in his laughter. Never again will I stand next to him against the chill of the marine breeze, shivering and chuckling and chatting about all the things that I want to discuss. Never again will I soar with him, as light as a cloud, my fingers wrapped round the swinging lines and my feet flying thrillingly out into midair. Again I think of the black compass and its spinning needle and how I can pull it free and gaze upon it while Alexander will never see it again. Never. The pit of sorrow yawns deep within me and the ruddy face of my father melts away into a numbing sea of empty darkness.

The distant murmur of the waves dances upon my deafened ears and my petrified eyes remained locked emptily upon the white compass-face, the little black case clutched desperately in the shuddering gasp of my one good hand as my bandaged and injured arm throbs with a horrible, pounding agony. The little compass-arrow quivers and points out in that one, light-gilded direction; it's trembling and shaking the most violently that I have ever seen it. I stare out numbingly into the wall of the cabin and suddenly I fear the thought of leaving the refuge of the _Crest_'s holds. I fear walking out into the sun and facing that bright and blinding glow of the day. I think of the sun shimmering on the water and in Alex's eyes and I don't think that I could ever return to those days, those dizzyingly-glazed days that seem so distant and frighteningly long-ago. They're lost and fraught with the unspeakable and I quiver and clutch the compass in my desperate grasp.

My eyes glaze over and suddenly I yearn to rise and tear after this heading of mine, this far-away beacon of hope that glimmers so tantalizingly on the edges of my misted horizon. I dream of spilling daylight and of the wind as it plays so beautifully against my sun-kissed skin, the gusts whooshing and billowing in the whipping folds of the sails that dance briskly over my head. Ignoring the excruciating throbbing of my wounded arm, I slide weakly from my cot and find myself floating out distantly over the sun-washed, bustling deck, peering guardedly at the compass face that I've tucked carefully underneath the folds of blanket which I clutch so frantically about myself. The wind bites and snaps, the spilling sunlight glitters out over the singing surf, the crew chatters restlessly, and the captain bellows out from his helm-post, his dark hair flying in the wind and his hands clutched victoriously on the wheel.

"Drop the mooring line; ye heard me, the mooring line, you wild bunch of sea-beasts! Here we make port; got to clean up after that hell of a time in the hands of the sea! Steady she goes, hear hear! Carefully now; we don't want to scratch up that pretty little boat that's already docked-that could cost old Captain Sparrow a pretty penny, you know."

He gestures out over the water and my eyes follow his stabbing fingers, his fingers which point in the exact same direction as the trembling needle of my little black compass. The sun winks and the ocean smiles and the sky gleams a brilliant shade of blue, a vivid blue that is stabbed by the proud rise of a whipping mass of flowing black sails. Sails that are attached to the most wonderful thing that I have seen.


	30. The Pearl

_The Pearl _

My feet are scraping across the dock and my eyes are locked upon her,

the surf roaring in my ears and the wind dancing in her proud black sails.

She's so beautiful that I can hardly stand it

and I wonder how I've gone so long without gazing upon her,

with her towering masts

and her daring hull

and the way that she so gracefully rides the sun-gilded waves.

Like an angel.

Like a cloud.

Like the glass-spun sea foam that drifts idly by on the rushing tide.

It's nearly mystic, it is, and I cannot bear to look away.

She's a striking hue,

so dark that it rivals the blackness of the stars' midnight perch.

I find myself expecting to catch a glimpse of the Great Bear,

swimming in the great black of the ship's bow and

glittering like a string of scattered diamonds

and winking down at me from the suspended velvet cushion upon which

it sits.

The crew bustles about me and

I feel their elbows and their eyes jabbing my sides

but I cannot bear just to walk away.

I stand in the eye of this storm,

the world spiraling about me and but one thing standing visibly

in front of me:

ahead she awaits,

bathed in light and

darkness

and the

promise

of something much more.

She could carry me away to safety over tussled seas

or she could bear me in a cloud of

light

as I sail ahead into the energy of

victory

and the promise of

adventure.

Her I could lead.

Her I could take as my own.

She gazes fondly upon me and shyly I gawk back.

In a shattered moment,

the captain seizes my good arm and coldly he pulls me away.

I struggle to hold the blankets about me and to

keep a hand on the compass,

the compass whose

deep black hue matches that of

this stunning black ship.

I throw another forlorn gaze over my shoulder and then

I realize it.

And I know of what the compass had been yearning to lead me to for all this long time:

…to what I want most in this world.

Providence sparkles in my eyes and I stumble blindly along,

washed by the breath of the sea and by

the dark, striking form that still lies

embedded in my awestruck vision.

What a beautiful thing this ship is.

And I cannot look away.

In my mind's eye, I imagine her name, the only name befitting such a beautiful thing,

the name that is surely etched in silver upon her confident hull:

_The Black Pearl_

is what I will call her.

And I promise that I'll return tomorrow.


	31. Wounds

_Wounds_

The _Crest_ groans underneath us. She groans and cries and shudders with every sloshing wave that splashes her quivering sides. But I have not an ear left to spare for her constant crying and complaining; I spend dwindling hours dawdling about and gawking at the wharf, the wharf of this shifty town called San Yolanda. The townspeople scuttle about like frightened sand-crabs, their eyes trembling and their feet that patter swiftly away in our wake.

The captain's griping seems that it will never end; he says that he can't wait to leave this hell-baked spit of a rock and head back out to open waters.

"Not even one blasted pub round this joint; not even one decent bloody pub! How can a pirate expect to survive without even one single bloody blasted pub? The place boasts its convenience for us sailors but they don't even run a single pub!"

But as hard as he urges, the _Crest_ cannot carry us. She stands weak from the tussle, weak from the wind, weak from the waves, and weak from the whipping words that stream from the enraged mouth of the captain. Dad. It seems like an age since I referred to him so. But as of now it seems wrong, cold, and even indecent. In my mind's eye, Captain Sparrow stands with the gleam of death in his eyes and with the blood of the blameless splattered horribly upon his gleaming cutlass. My eyes fall upon him and my insides squirm and my wounded arm aches; I drift away with the wind and find myself staring again out over that midnight-black ship, that lovely thing called the _Black Pearl_. She smiles out at me and I cannot look away. I clutch at my hidden compass and cling to the railing and yearn to topple free and drift out like a bottle until I am swallowed deep into the frigid depths of the frolicking sea.

The crewmen hustle about me and whack away dismally at the shaken skeleton of the ship, splintering and sawing and patching up the gaping holes through which the ocean gulps and crashes. I shiver and quaver and throb and think of Alexander, think of how he is gone and how unlike the _Crest_, what has been done to him can never be repaired. Ever. I gasp and reel and find myself fastened to railing once again, trembling and gazing at that proud figure of a ship that slices the sky with the rise of her lofty masts.

I wander and flounder down upon the dock and feel the boards creaking ominously underneath my feet, the tide thundering and the waves hissing and shattering upon the white sands of the beach, the salty smell of anguish breaking so solemnly into the stifling air. I sit and stare and gaze out over that striking thing, that graceful midnight vessel that I call the _Pearl_. Every day I find myself sitting here, as if my constant presence will somehow lead this ship to trot loyally along after me when we sail off again. I shift and stare numbly down at the rippling face of the ocean, at that funny boy with the long, dark, beaded hair, the faded red bandana, the charcoal-lined eyes, and the bandaged arm. I sigh and I know that he doesn't know what he wants. He doesn't even know what is real any longer. My heels rock me to and fro, the wind skims over the water, and the _Pearl _pitches elegantly_, _sighing and bobbling and watching me thoughtfully. And how I wish that I could only please her.


	32. The Captain

_The Captain _

"Ah…Do you like her?"

I whirl in a daze and behind me stands a glowing form of a man, smiling an odd smile and the sunlight glinting blindingly off of his bone-white teeth. He has peachy skin and shimmery blonde hair that sends my eyes skittering away with their hardened memories, memories of a boy with a golden head of hair that shone in an identical way.

I blink and say, "Who?"

He gestures out over the wharf and the glittering aqua-blue sea, the black body of the_ Pearl_ rolling so gracefully along with the bobbing flow of the tide.

"My ship. She's a pretty one, 'ain't she? The finest vessel in the Caribbean, I reckon."

I fidget and divert my gaze and feel my heart sink down into the crystal-white sand at my feet. So she has an owner.

"Aye…she's beautiful."

I haven't a clue as to why I've blurted this out to a stranger and so I shy away, resting my chin in my good hand and stealing another look at that swan of a ship. A knowing smile sprouts on the man's face and he jauntily seats himself on the dock beside me, the sun glinting off of his hair and glimmering in his eyes, his eyes that shine like a pair of flat, blue pools, calm and true and somehow distant.

"Ain't much of a talker, are you, boy?" he says, chuckling to himself as I blink and pretend that I haven't heard him. "Saw you and yer crew pull up here a few days ago; heard there was this awful storm out on the sea…worst one in decades, some said."

I stare out into the sky and the sea rushes gently beneath us. The man sighs and reaches to place his hand friendlily upon my shoulder; I gasp slightly and I shudder away, instinctively clutching the cloth bandages under the black-and-blue fingers of my uninjured hand. His eyes widen slightly as he notices my wounds for what seems to be the first time; I expect him to ask but yet he remains silent, his eyes flitting out over the horizon, some of his former liveliness slowly fading away.

"Hard times?" he asks.

I shrug and wrap my arm round my knees.

"Well, since I reckon you'll be here fer a while, ya might as well get to know a few of us sailor-types; the name's Thomas. Thomas Brisbane, at your service."

He holds his rough hand out to shake and I grudgingly oblige, offering my good hand and my eyes remaining fixed on the fluttering sails of the _Pearl_ as the wind whips voraciously through them.

"Have you a name yerself, lad, or shall I just have to give one to ya?"

"It's Jack," I say numbly, "Jack Sparrow."

"Ah…." Thomas murmurs, his eyes sliding out over the remote horizon as he thoughtfully clasps his fingers together. "I've heard that name before; heard of a…a _Captain_ Sparrow whose ship nearly ran aground whilst he was runnin' away from a fleet of nasty Brits; nearly got the poor feller, they did."

"Aye…" I murmur, my stomach twisting unpleasantly as my thoughts skim back upon that fateful day, that day upon which I had first become acquainted with the bitter, remorseless hatred that festers and grips the mighty East India Trading Company. The captain had lost his first mate on that day. I had been but six years of age.

"You know of Captain Sparrow?" Thomas asks incredulously, shifting and raising his pale eyebrows. "Funny; the bloke's not too well known in most parts…only fer his knowledge of the Code and fer the many times that he barely escaped with his life, that is. Seems to have a bit of a knack fer that."

My eyes drift away, downcast.

"I know him." I say simply. Thomas needs to know no more.


	33. The Girl at the Window

_The Girl at the Window_

She has hair that shines like the night and skin that matches the full moon, the moon that spills its silvery light all over the sleepy midnight town. Until her obsidian eyes lock themselves upon mine, I don't even know that I'm in the street, wandering about like some sort of stray cat. The captain has gone to sleep and it's John on watch; it had been so easy to just slip away, to swing down from the side of the bobbling _Crest _and to land neatly upon the rickety dock, the moon glimmering on the glossy black waves that rumble and crash into bursts of glittering white foam, so white and brilliant that their glow nearly pierces the dark of the night. I had scampered off over the bone-white sand, the wind breathing in my ears and the sea thundering at my feet. The _Pearl_ had looked so beautiful in the black mask of night; in fact, the ship was so bloody dark that against the sky, you could hardly see her at all. But she was beautiful. There was no doubt about that.

I'm not sure how I ended up walking along the moonlit streets of sleeping San Yolanda, my mind drifting so far away that I hadn't even taken note of where I was headed. My feet had slid silently over the cobbled roads and so did my eyes, but I did so blindly, blankly, numbly. Why again have I sneaked out tonight?

Puzzled, I turn back towards the window of the cottage, the golden-lit window whose light spills from the frame and tumbles down onto the silvery street where it shimmers like a square of liquid flame, a flame that yearns to melt the coldness of the milky moonlight. My eyes dart up into the light and there the girl stands, leaning gracefully at the windowsill, her lips slightly parted and the moon glittering in her shining eyes, the eyes that are fixed so intently on me. Her hair is long and thick and wavy and dark, and her long locks tumbling down her shoulders like water and drifting and floating absently in the faint night breeze. Very well groomed she is, and I figure that at least I'll have accomplished something tonight. She must have much money on that person of hers, and money is something that I could always use.

I'm about to open my mouth to speak when she lifts one thin little finger and beckons at me, her nails glinting as she motions for me to come join her at her window. Aye. And so I swiftly brush my hair behind my shoulders, draw a deep breath, and stride through the dazzling patches of moonlight that glow softly upon the road, trotting over the stone and over to the window of that lighted cottage, the girl's gaze still frozen upon me, a strange look in her eyes. I'm not sure as to what it means, and I'm still thinking about it when a smooth voice sleekly splits the silence.

"Hello."

Her voice is like velvet and it flows from her glistening lips as smoothly as the sleeveless, silk gown that is draped upon her thin frame. My eyes slide quickly over her and I find my heart pounding away into a frenzy; she's barely got anything on, this girl….it looks like her nightgown and nothing more. I do not know what to do. I had thought up something to say, but as of now, I have no bloody clue as to what it was. My lips stammer and I try to speak but a lovely sound cuts over me. She's laughing, the girl. It's a stunning sound, like clear ring of a bell, like the singing of the wind in the sails or like the whoosh of the ocean as it slides beneath the hull. All I can do is stand there, staring.

"Lost your confidence, have you?" she says in a bit of an accent, smiling like the suns that twinkle so pleasantly in her eyes. "And you started off so nicely as well…Ha; I'd almost thought it would go off a bit more smoothly."

She casts her eyes upon me, as if expecting me to respond, but still I cannot move. I cannot speak. I am frozen, helpless, thoughtless in her grasp. What again had I been planning?

"Heavens….are you a pirate… really? Grief; that's a first…I don't think I've ever rendered one of those fellows speechless before…They're usually very…well, straightforward."

I've no idea what she's talking about, but I don't want to leave her rambling to herself like this.

"Hmmm…how about we start like this….I, my name is Morella; what may yours be?"

What_ is _my name? I stumble for a second before I speak, feeling extremely dim-witted.

"I'm…erm….Jack."

"Jack….I see…."

She sort of breathes my name like a scent, gazing deep into the night and then her eyes flitting back at me. My body seizes up and I stand helplessly before her, peering up into her window and blinking dumbly, absentmindedly fiddling with the deep violet-stoned ring that glitters like a moonbeam upon my finger. I'm not quite sure as to exactly how a girl can be beautiful (haven't really thought about it before), but whatever it is, this girl….Morella….she is beautiful. Beautiful like the _Pearl_. Truly all that beautiful, with all the confidence of the _Pearl_'s soaring masts, all the mystery of her midnight-black hue, and all the grace with which she rides the slapping waves. The moonlight rains down upon us and I find myself seated upon Morella's bed, her bed that is made with mussed velvet sheets that tickle my thighs like the cloth of Mum's sofa. The room is lit with a pair of candle-lamps that bathe us in a kind of a warm, rosy glow, a radiance that shimmers in Morella's eyes and shines her in her long hair, her hair that brushes softly along the small of her back. And she's smiling at me, patting at the part of the bed right beside her.

The world tilts and my mind spirals and my eyes fall upon her ornate chest of drawers, the one that stands right beside her bed, right behind where she sits. Upon that chest, there sits a small drawstring bag; with one glance I know that it sags with the weight of gold, and I remember what it was that I came for. I must keep my head.

Swallowing, I scoot over to settle beside Morella and her cheek brushes up softly against mine, her arm looping tenderly round my shoulders and sending a shiver tingling down my spine. I don't know what she wants. I don't know what to do, how to act. And so I sit, staring in the darkness.

"From where do you come, Jack?"

A question, a question she's asked me. I swallow and gather my wits, softly and slowly inching my hand right past her hips, reaching desperately for her money-bag.

"I…I don't truly know; I…I just…erm…sail all over. O…on Dad's ship….aye, that's it…"

"Oh, so your father is the captain, is he?"

"Aye."

"Does your ship have a name, or well, something like that, I suppose?"

"Aye; all ships have names…that's how you tell them apart…erm…It's...it's called the _Crest_…see…."

"Dreadfully sorry…it's just that I don't know much of anything about sailing; you're probably much better at it than I."

I attempt to shrug but Morella holds me tight against her; my eyes widen as I realize that she's caught my hand, the one that I've been slinking so stealthily over her hip, just to grab hold of her money-bag. She clutches it in hers and she fingers the purple-stoned ring, looking back over me with curiosity, a strange darkness clouding her eyes, eyes that glint only mere centimeters away from my face.

"Jack…are you….you aren't already_ married_…can you be?"

"Oh…no, of course not…it's just; that's only just…a, a ring that I only just found…on the beach, you see. Just a trinket…it's nothing…"

"Oh…I see; sorry…."

I murmur away a bit of nonsense, my hand still locked tightly within hers. She's got a surprisingly firm grip, and when I try to pull my fingers free she simply tightens her grasp and presses my palm gently against the small of her back; my heart explodes in my chest and I can hear it thudding noisily in my ears. I don't know but I hope that Morella can't hear the beating too. The silk of her gown is smooth and slippery beneath my fingers and underneath the fabric I can sense the soft warmth of Morella's skin. It sends another wave of heat washing over my face and I feel myself shuddering away, awkward dampness breaking out on my face and my palms.

"I…"

"Say you'll come visit me. While you're here. Promise?"

My lips tremble wordlessly and suddenly she tips and dives into my blank eyes, soft wetness pressing itself ever so gently against my stunned lips. For a second, I am drowned in this delicate warmth until I manage a gasp and suddenly Morella is gone, bathed in the darkness, giggling like a wind chime and pressing herself softly against me, her warm breath prickling against my throat. I sit there, paralyzed. My mind swirls and fogs and I think of the wind, the sand, the surf, the gold, and the captain…all until she sighs and leans gently back into my eyes. Her mouth touches mine and again I find myself lost. How beautiful she is. How beautiful. Over her shoulder, the moon glimmers like a pearl hanging in the sky.


	34. Two of the Most Beautiful

_Two of the Most Beautiful _

I've brought Morella down to the docks today. I don't really know why I have, but here we stand, her hand in mine and the sea rushing beneath our feet. The _Pearl_ rolls like a blossom in the water and the raining sunlight plays so beautifully in Morella's long, blowing hair and in her glittering eyes. I stand and watch, my breath taken from me as her lips break into an enchanted smile, the lofty laughter spilling like liquid from her soft mouth. I am mystified, and the world tilts and the ocean sings. ***

This morning, I'd found myself wandering back to her cottage and disappearing into the darkness, and after we'd broken apart, the shadows sliding over us and the energy tingling in the air, Morella had said that she yearned to visit the ocean.

"It's just so lovely….that wide water; it…it makes me, makes me want to strip off this dress of mine and just dive right into it, to feel that…that beautiful touch of the water and…Oh, Jack, I want to go now; I want to go today!"

And so I'd gathered her up and taken her. Since I'd first drifted through the sun-bathed streets and clambered through her window, not once has she let go of me. Her touch is always there, twirling like wind in my tousled hair, running like water over my thighs, melting like honey in my mouth. Even though it tangles my mind and brings the awkward, clammy wetness to my skin, I still find myself stumbling on back once again. I've no clue why. But when she wraps her arms about me, my body feels light, free…I lose myself into the radiance and if Morella was ever to release me, I would hover up into the air like a cloud to be swallowed into the dizzying heights of the yawning, crystal-blue sky, never again to sink back down to earth. Morella pulls herself against me and her warm breath hovers on my neck and suddenly I don't feel so lost, so alone. And so I lean closer, my pulse thundering in my ears like the crashing surf. It's a beautiful thing, this feeling. I want to wrap my arms round her body and never let go. ***

Suddenly I feel her touch on my back and my feet fly out from under me, my thoughts scattering off into the sun-gilded sky as I soar from the wood of the dock and plunge deep beneath the waves in a breaking shower of glittering bubbles, tiny pockets of air that catch the filtering beams of golden sun and tickle my skin as they dribble past me like upturned, crystallized rainfall. I float there in wonder, my clothes and my hair swirling weightlessly about me as I drift and stare upward into the gleaming patch of the sun, the blinding whiteness that rolls and ripples and glitters like something magical. For a moment I'm frozen in this timeless dreamland, the water cool against my skin and my thoughts washing away like kelp in the current.

Unthinking, I gaze blurredly into the blue and suddenly I remember that time so long ago when the old fool Skinner had knocked me from the rail of the _Crest_, how I'd been hovering like a spirit under the water, unable to move, my lungs searing and burning desperately for the air. Reality tugs chillingly at my mind and my fidgeting muscles splinter the serenity, my arms thrashing lethargically and weightily in the heavy soup of the water, my legs kicking and my eyes stinging as I clash and struggle for the surface. My aqua-washed fingers grope for the air and the violet-stoned ring glitters something lovely.

Another shower of jeweled light suddenly rains down into the sea and I feel Morella's strong grip closing on my hand, pulling me. For a second I'm ascending up into the sky until the tension breaks and my head crashes through the glass surface, droplets cracking and sparkling in the sun as I bobble and gasp thirstily for air, the waves slapping me and Morella's jubilant laughter bubbling about me.

"It must be so wonderful, to be a pirate lad and to be able to do this every day! Just look at that sun, Jack, look at that sea! See how it goes, just on and on and it never stops? Oh, look; look at how beautiful it is!"

She slips through the glossy waves like a baby dolphin, giggling and splashing and drifting giddily around me as the great ocean breathes so heavily in our waterlogged ears, the salt smell of the waves drifting along in the gusting marine breeze. Even as I dip and sway and tread the water, my eyes remain fixed upon Morella, gaping, wordless. Even with her coal-black hair dripping and plastered to her soggy skin, her great splendor still remains, as dazzling as a pearl, glowing with the sleekness and the milky luminescence of the radiant moon. Her lips brush mine and they taste of the bitter salt of the ocean, blended with the purity of morning light and the sweetness that sits so elegantly upon her tongue. My arms snake round to hold her and I know that it's the world that I have floating in my grasp.


	35. Bits and Pieces

_Bits and Pieces _

The captain says he's seen them. Lurking about, out of sight. I overhear him while I sit uselessly in my cot, my fingers rubbing my sore arm as his words drift carelessly upon the wind.

"Bloody redcoats…." He mutters, the hatred dripping from his gravely voice, the voice that rumbles and scrapes and grazes my ears. "They're here; I can sense them. The Brits. A man could never miss that blasted movement of theirs; not by the face of the moon he couldn't."

Smith can scarcely believe it, and he hovers about the helm with an air of agitation, his eyes darting and scanning the clear horizon as he one-handedly scrubs away at the deck, the sea murmuring and rocking the recovering body of the _Crest_.

"You certain, captain? I've been to San Yolanda once many a year ago, and the place has always been a pirate port…"

"_Pirate port_," the captain scoffs, throwing his head in a dark cloud and spitting angrily upon the deck. "Hardly. They don't run a single blasted pub and they call themselves a _pirate port_. Not bloody likely. We've had to sack the place in order to weasel every darned drop of their rum."

"But we've been here for nigh a month and we've had no big troubles…" Stanley, the young, freckled deckhand, eagerly pipes up. "The folk haven't spoken a word to ye nor any other man; I'm certain that they mean us no harm."

"That's the trouble, ye empty headed fool."

I haven't spoken to him, the captain, for nigh the entire time that we've been docked here, patching up the holes and gathering ourselves together amidst the breathy wind and the staring sun those beams shatter and gleam blindingly off of the rolling waves. The land seems to close in about us, choking, suffocating. It clings to us with greedy, sun-baked fingers, fingers that hold on fast and refuse to release us from their crushing grip.

Sometimes I struggle and sometimes I run but can never seem to pull myself free. I always end up sitting, helpless, with the sun glaring down at me and the water thrashing around me. It's maddening, being trapped here for ever so long. I yearn to head out again over open water, to feel the tender breeze on my face and to hear the slap of the waves and the rush of the canvas as it billows and fills with the fresh, flowing air. But when I flip open my compass, the little arrow refuses to set; instead it whirls round like the boiling surf and the restless trade wind, swirling and spiraling and gyrating to and fro, to and fro. And then I realize that I do not know what I want. Or if I want anything at all.

I can wander about the dock like windblown sand, and I can spend long hours bathed in Morella's sugary warmth, and I can pace pointlessly back and forth, my edgy eyes set upon the fluttering sails of the _Pearl_, the spectacular black sails that blow like graceful tendrils of smoke and fearlessly slice the brilliant gem of a sky. They are all beautiful, all wonderful. I want nothing more than to leave, and yet I cannot bear to. Morella embraces me, like a sunbeam, like a goddess, and I lose myself. The_ Pearl_ rides and drifts, cloudlike, and I lose myself. The ocean calls out so passionately and tantalizingly, skimming under my nose and whipping through my hair, and again I lose myself. Soon there will be no more of me left to lose.


	36. In the Mist

_In the Mist_

I've seen it. The red. In the mist. Swirling, flitting, darting to and fro, mockingly, harshly. I spin round, my heart screaming and tearing at my chest, but now I see nothing. Nothing. Nothing but the blotted mess of dreary fog that sits so lazily over drowsy San Yolanda, fat and full and refusing to budge. The sea-fog is so thick that I can barely make out the blurred outlines of the buildings that line the cobbled road; all I can see is their dark, soupy silhouettes and the breath of the mist and it stirs sluggishly about me, cool and soggy and compressing on the back of my neck. This weather is strange. Everything seems to be a bit strange.

Sweat breaks out on my clammy skin and my hair swirls darkly about me, my eyes flashing desperately as I stare urgently into the blue-grey labyrinth of the fog-drenched streets. Nothing. My sharp eyes had previously caught a flash of a threatening, glaring scarlet, gleaming menacingly at me from amongst the sodden blur. My fingers graze the air and my eyes narrow, the cold metal of a ring searing icily against my sticky palm. This ring I have stolen; I'd slipped it stealthily from the display of a lonely jeweler and tucked it ever-so-carefully into my fist, my eyes darting carefully as I had coolly drifted away. The ring is for Morella, to slide upon her elegant finger and to gleam like a flame in the night, to follow her wherever she may wander. For in about a week's time, I will most likely never see her again. For in a week's time, the _Crest_ will take to the sea to wander yet again. I don't know if I'm excited or if I want to throw myself screaming from the pinnacle of the sky. Most likely the latter. Blast.

Something moves, shifts, the silence splits and I find myself tearing off down the street with my hair flying and my heart hammering, the stolen ring clutched tightly in my hand as my footsteps pound relentlessly across the stone. My lungs are burning and my legs are throbbing and then I realize that I don't even know what it is that I'm running from. Nothing, for all I know. Catching my breath, I clamber to a stop and swivel round, blinking and staring blankly into the fog. Nothing there is behind me. Nothing pursuing me. Nothing. What a fool I am. I mutter and slip the ring into my pocket and head out towards the cottage, the sea washing and drowning away my agitation, my steps ringing oddly upon the nearly vacant streets.

I breathe, run a hand through my hair, and scramble through her window in a kind of breathless anticipation. My feet slam down upon the floor and there she sits, like a blushed magnolia perching ever-so-gracefully upon her velvet bedspread. Her shimmering eyes catch hold of me and her luster is ignited, the light glittering in her gaze and her rosy lips blooming into a glowing smile.

"Why hello, Jack; oh…now what have you got there? Some kind of nasty pirate explosive?"

A faint grin colors my lips and I feel like seizing her away in my grasp and floating off into the sky, to feel the warmth of her skin and to never to let go.

"Just a little bit of something for you, love; here…."

I uncurl my fingers and the silver ring glimmers like the moon upon my palm. Morella's lips part slightly, breathily, and I nestle up beside her and take hold of her hand, sighing and sliding the silvery band onto her ring-finger; my skin is rough and callused but I quaver and keep my touch as tender as possible. She holds her bleached hand up before her and the ring glitters like sunlight in the rose-colored sparkle of her flickering candle-lamps.

"It's beautiful…" she says, laughing and trembling and wrapping me in her folds of blissful warmth, her sweetness brushing my lips and her fingers tangling themselves in my hair. I breathe and lean into her when I feel a foreign, swooping rush of cold ramming through my gut. A gasp leaks from my lips and I tremble and shudder away, my mouth hanging open as I stare dumbly into the mist outside of Morella's bedroom window. She grips my shoulder insistently and against I spot the tiniest glimmer of red, lurking about like a spirit in the fog-drenched streets of San Yolanda.

"What…?"

"Nothing." I say quickly, "It's nothing."

But I can still feel the eeriness upon me, staring, and I ponder and gaze but I can't seem to indentify it. It's frightening. Maybe I have finally lost my mind to the mist.


	37. The Man of the Sea

_The Man of the Sea_

"Here; ask the boy, ye old fool-I reckon it's the little boy's turn to ask ye fer a story! After all we've bin squabblin' round nigh all night long like some old pigeons, hardly listenin' to any a spare word…"

"Aye, even I'd say that that's fair enough…"

And so old Timothy swivels round to face me, the flicker of the oil lamps playing softly on his smiling, roughly chiseled face and the fire dancing in his giddy, twinkling eyes.

"So….what'll it be, Little Sparrow? Yer choice."

The old pet name stabs at my ears and my eyes skitter off into the glittering blackness of the clear night sky, frustration building like a blaze within me. I haven't a clue as to how old I am (haven't bothered to keep track), and yet I know that I'm hardly a child any longer. I simply know it. It cannot be. Seems that I've gone by the crew unnoticed, and I shift uncomfortably on my perch upon a creaking food-barrel, the _Crest_ groaning and moaning beneath us as the sea breathes in and out in its cool, salt-misted rushes. I feel the refreshing touch of the breeze on my skin as well as the weight of the eyes of the small cluster of men who wait eagerly for my reply. And so I reply, lamely at best.

"I don't know-I don't know of many…stories."

"Oh, come here-I know every dang blasted legend that's ever spilled from the lip of man, boy; surely I know of any of the little tales that might peek their heads into that mind of yers!"

"No; it's just that…I can't say that-that I know of any of them, that's all…"

Tim shoots me a dumbfounded look, clearly taken aback, and I let out a sigh and cast my eyes back into the glimmering night sky, connecting my gaze with that of the winking Great Bear and wondering where Smith wanders tonight. He and I haven't spoken in many a fortnight, it seems.

"_Never heard of one single story_…Where've ye been all of yer life, boy? We pirates live on these bloody tales, ye know!"

There is a drunken murmur of agreement and I rest my chin edgily upon my knee, throwing my gaze out over the ring of ruddy faced crewmen, their cheeks flushed and their eyes twinkling with the drinks that they hold clutched in their soiled fingers. Tanner throws his head back and takes a sloshing swig, the sharp smell of alcohol burning in my nostrils. At least I have some company on tonight's watch. I sniff and shake out my hair and turn sourly back towards Tim, who is still laughing and ranting on about some rubbish, his companions nodding and jeering at his freely bouncing words.

"I say we tell the lad a basic one, shall we?" red-haired Bennington says, grinning. "How 'bout the story of good old Davy Jones; how'll that one do?"

"Aye!" Tim cries earnestly, his eyes sparkling merrily as he throws his hands up gleefully into the yawning curtain of night. "That'd be the one, it would-Now,…boy…"

My eyes dart over to him and are immediately pierced by the vigor of his deep gaze; I blink and nearly shudder with the surprise.

"How much do ye know of Davy Jones, young lad?"

"A fair amount."

"Well, spill it, won't ye?"

"Let's see…well, I heard that he was some sort of strange thing, nigh a sea-creature, and that he had no heart and that he used to run round the sea like a squall and strike down the ships of all men-not a soul ever survived it, I heard."

My voice falters and the swinging shadows of the overhead lines swamp round my feet.

"Ah, I see. So ye've got the right idea 'cross yer head…that's good, boy, that's good. Now just ye hold tight and I'll tell ye the rest…"

Old Timothy clears his throat with a hack and I can nearly feel the anticipation clinging in the air, aglow in the crewmen's eyes, tingling and smarting inside of myself. The barrel creaks beneath me as my weight shifts, my body leaning closer as to inhale every word that spills from his oddly wizened, wind-chapped lips.

"See, mates: Davy Jones is a fiend of a man; he's such an empty soul that a fellow could look straight through his eyes and gaze upon the nastiness inside of his rotted hide-there'd be not a soul there to look upon. He's got no feelings, old Jones. He's nothing but an empty shell, consumed by the sea and by the void of the emotionless-some say that he's half-fish, half-lobster, half-squid, but whatever he be, it ain't human. Not a chance. The man controls the sea and flits round with all the might of a hurricane, he does; his ship's called the _Flying Dutchman_, they say, and supposedly the thing plows along beneath the cold surface of the waves, creeping and slinking and blending into the body of the great ocean, waiting to terrorize all who cross his bloody path. And if his little vessel wasn't fearsome enough, it's been said that Jones has also got a mighty monster under his icy thumb: the kraken. This kraken can be unleashed upon any poor fool who Jones has damned to bear the _black spot_, and trust me, those cursed fellows have never, ever lived to tell the tale.

"But as ye might be guessin', Jones wasn't always such a beast, no, most definitely not. He was a real man, a man of life and dreams and everything glittery that beckons from way out over the horizon. Jones was a man of the sea. Jones _is_ a man of the sea. He fell in love with the sea, oh, ever so desperately in love. But the pain it caused him was far too much for him to bear. It hurt him, crushed him, thrashed him and ground him into despair, and yet it did not kill the poor fellow. Alas it didn't, and poor Jones could not stand it for any longer. The desperate man committed the most unspeakable of humanly deeds: with a cold blade he carved out his own still-beating heart from his bosom, as to never feel the unbearable pain of mortal emotions, not ever again. And so he cannot.

"To this blessed day, Davy Jones roams the sea like the chilling arctic wind, undying, bound to live until the end of time. He's been consumed by the ocean and by the emptiness that swarms within his bosom, and the man yearns for nothing more than to damn every good man to an eternity trapped within his wicked, otherworldly domain, the fate that awaits all those who die at sea: Davy Jones' locker."

The silence hangs in the air like a sickness and not a man can bring himself to speak, to shatter the moment that swims eerily in this hovering, foreboding darkness. I stare out over the black waves and I do not know what to make of it. A myth? A legend? Or is there really a sea-man that lurks beneath the surface, ready to drag all of the innocent down alongside him? My eyes stare blankly and the water suddenly slams icily into the bow of the docked _Crest_, as if Jones himself was having a laugh at us.


	38. At my Throat

_At my Throat_

Shots shatter the muted grey dawn and the steely surf thunders in wrath as the irate shouts and battle cries rise like hot embers in a fire, the smoldering hate and the deadly energy piling up in the atmosphere and pressing itself down thickly upon us. The waves crash and crumble and writhe, white and tumbling upon the sand, their breaking crests the color of bleached white bone. The drifting mass of unnatural fog drowns the port of San Yolanda and seeps chillingly through my sticky skin, swimming thickly round the whipping black sails of the _Pearl_, curling like frozen breath round the creaking masts of the _Crest_, and swirling eerily round the brilliant red of the coats of the Brits that dash madly across the pallid sands of the weary beach, kicking up the grains as their feet pound for the docks where the _Crest_ is anchored.

I stand frozen upon the deck as the crew clambers frantically about me, clutching the railing with my compass resting against my hip and my heart caught helplessly in my throat as the breeze rips at my flying strands of unruly hair. The redcoats are here. Somehow they have found us. Somehow they have landed here. And I know that they will not cease until they've killed us. Captured us. Shipped us to the noose in chains. All of us; every last one. Their icy musket fire punches through the mist and I swiftly draw my gleaming blade, something strange glimmering in my somber eyes. Wind whistles in my ears and I grip the hilt tightly in my callused hands, my clammy breath struggling through my gritted teeth. I know what I must protect.

There is a dying scream and then something catches my eye in a glimmer of flashing scarlet, like a scalding drop of windswept blood, like the terror that colors the horizon on the crimson eve of an approaching tempest. I spot the flash of a British musket and the wisp of a groomed feather plume and so I grip my sword and let it swing; there is a sudden strangled cry and the boarding redcoat crumples to the ground in a shower of searing hot blood, the vivid scarlet droplets shattering in the air and peppering my skin and clothing. I stare downward at the man who lies blankly on the ground, muttering wordlessly, the life draining from his eyes as he writhes and clutches at his torn stomach, the salty stench of the blood spilling through the air. My teeth grinding painfully into my lower lip, I strike the fallen man until he moves no more, and then I swivel and throw a blow at another approaching Brit who leaps over the railing and scrambles to blow his icy musket bullet through my head. My blade strikes his bosom and he sags and tumbles back over the rail where he is swallowed by the thirsty sea with a sort of sickening splash, the silver waters tinged a bit crimson from the bloodshed.

I find myself torn of breath and staring down into the bay when a blow like a riptide slams into my back; my sword clatters to the floor along with my own winded body, my eyes spinning as I cough and hack and gasp for air as the many hordes of footsteps pound all about me. Cold steels grates and glints above my head and my trembling fingers grope at my belt and the scream of my shot suddenly slices like a knife through the wounded air; the Brit shudders and falls dead and the pistol shakes and smokes in my wobbling grasp, my breath tearing at my lungs and my muscles aching as I wince and pull myself to my feet.

I gasp and lean against the blood-splattered railing and the _Crest_ is enveloped in a swarming sea of red. The British swarm like insects about the deck, their cutlasses glinting like lightning and like the fire that smolders in their unfeeling eyes. They clamber up the rigging and plummet from the crow's nest and pepper the air with their blasting, fiery musket shots; Captain Sparrow's crewmen cry and tumble and collapse heavily upon the deck that they've worked for so many blasted hours to scrub clean. The redcoats bellow and bend and reload and fire again, the redness of their uniforms piercing like death through the sluggish soup of the morning fog. There are too many of them. I seize the hilt of my sword and slash here and there, swiping and striking and blocking and thrashing and many a man falls at my feet, but I know already that the battle is lost. I bring my blade down upon a sprawled man who snatches at my leg and then I throw my gaze frantically upward, where it flits and settles desperately upon the elegant black form of the lovely _Pearl_, soaring and drifting like smoke on the tussled harbor. My strenuous breath catches in my throat and suddenly I know what we must do. What I must do.

"**Smith!**" I scream, my dark hair swirling about me as I swivel about in the fog, my bloodstained blade glinting coldly as I hold it up protectively before me. Smith's familiar gaze pierces me and he pauses and swings with his sword that is clutched desperately in his one good hand, his cloud of silvery hair blowing about in the sea's sullen breath.

"Smith; you've got haul up the mooring lines-bring about the anchor-we've got to make for open water-**now**!"

"Ye mean we're to leave the port, Sparrow?; have you lost your mind to the wind, boy? Yer not the captain of this vessel and the Code clearly states that…"

"To _hell_ with the Code; we've got to head out to open water! We can't win, Smithy; can't you see…don't you see?"

Something washes like water over his features and I know in an instant that he's understood. My sights remain frozen upon his vanishing form until they drift and catch something upon the beach and suddenly I lose my capability to think-it simply leaves me, screaming, streaming from my body and lost to the howling surf and the whipping wind. A man in a red coat, his uniform like a blemish upon the murky hull of the bobbing _Pearl. _A collapsed body lying lifelessly in the sand, the surf tugging at it and washing and drenching it with breaking sea-foam. A body with shining blonde hair like Alexander's. Thomas. The man who owned the _Black Pearl_. The man who owned that graceful spirit of a ship, the ship with a hue so deep that she nearly looks like a piece of the night sky that had been somehow sliced from the heavens and fashioned into a seaworthy vessel by the light-bathed hands of a singing angel.

The very same ship that stands now with a red-clothed Brit at her helm.

Stealing her away to sea.

Never to be seen again.

I stand petrified, every inch of my body frozen. I cannot move. I cannot think. I cannot comprehend what is happening. I cannot let this happen. Never.

The air rushes dizzyingly past me and my mind spins and thaws out, my pulse pounding in my ears and my breath ripping at my lungs and my feet slamming ferociously against the blood-soaked deck, crimson and fire and death and smoke and fog all swirling sickeningly about me. I shove through the clamor with my prodding elbows and my swiping fingers. All that lies before me is that dark beauty of a ship, that unearthly vessel that floats so proudly at the dock adjacent to where the bloodied _Crest_ bobs desperately in the bleached surf. It dazzles my eyes and pulls me ahead and my fingers stretch out before me as I drift out into the pitching blackness that swims so elegantly within the light. I will save her. This is the ship that I will captain. The ship that I will steer over the sea with my back to the wind and my fingers placed confidently upon her wheel.

I breathe and dash and clamber for the railing when suddenly a great slicing agony rips like a blaze into my scalp, yanking me over backwards and forcing my chin back, my legs flailing and my arms thrashing and my eyes blotted with burning hot tears of pain. Before I can draw my weapon from my belt there is an icy flash of grating silver and I feel the frigid bite of steel pressed up threateningly against my exposed throat, my blood screaming in my veins and my horrified breath tearing at my throat, my scalp smarting as clutching foreign fingers knot themselves painfully into the matted locks of my hair. Terror popping in my head, I groan and squirm but the both of my arms are seized and the icy blade drives its greedy teeth into my flesh in a searing line of flame. The breath suddenly leaves me and the clammy gasp of a man's hot breath pants into my ear, the bloody din of the battle sounding viciously about us. I feel the flash of some fool's eyes on me and I catch the white of the redcoat's gaze before he swivels his head to look out over the intensifying battle that swathes the bloodstained deck. My eyes glaze over him and I can practically hear the gears clanking in his head; I suck in a breath and wonder why he hasn't already slit my throat.

"Oi, you, captain! Everyone! Stop; stop it!"

The dark stormy eyes of Captain Sparrow pierce coldly through me, his hair billowing in the gasping breeze and the silver crosses bound in his locks glinting in the muted light. He holds a blood-tainted blade and a pistol and he swirls about in a cloud of domineering blackness, the whites of his narrowed eyes just about jumping out at me and his grimacing mouth set in his usual marred scowl. It's as if hell itself has frozen over. Not a man can move.

"And what may ye be asking for…._sir_?" the captain spits in mock-respectful tone that drips with his nasty sneer and his bitter words. The redcoat's grasp tightens on my shoulders and he presses the blade threateningly against my exposed neck, his fingers clutching my hair and forcing my chin to pitch towards the gloomy sky above. I grit my teeth against the pain and I can feel my body trembling. Never have I been so humiliated.

"I'd advise that you instruct your...your _ruffians_ to cease their futile efforts, **captain**," the redcoat says self-righteously, the words dripping from his lips with such a thick feeling of superiority that I find my bruised fingers clenching into clammy fists that tremble and shake from the blaze of my ignited fury. A twisted smirk washes over the captain's face and his body relaxes, his teeth glinting as he chuckles lightly, a deep and rolling sound.

"And now why would I do that, Brit? Give me a single good reason."

The redcoat blinks dumbly and I feel his sword-point quavering against my neck.

"Why…ah…Why because I've got him!" the man stammers indignantly. "Your son; can't you see, I've got your boy here at the point of a sword!"

The blade bites at my flesh and the exasperated redcoat shakes me roughly by the shoulders, my bead-strings clacking softly in the wind and the pain searing on my stinging scalp.

"Don't you understand; I'll kill your little boy! Right here and right now, unless you drop your bloody weapons and come quietly; hasn't this happened to you before-don't you understand how this is done, pirate?" The redcoat's voice rings with his stammering incredulity and the captains lets out another mocking laugh, the hilt of his sword glittering in his hand and my stomach knotting nauseatingly.

"Well, then go on, do what ye wish…" The captains gestures dismissingly. "Carry on and kill the boy; I don't see how it matters to me."

"But-"

"Ye've already killed a number of me crewmen: my cook, a deckhand, a scout…I don't see why this boy should matter more than any of the other fools, and I don't see why ye bother to stop me just to alert me of such things. As I've said, carry on. What's to impede ye?"

Silence. The captain's face glows with a cold, knowing grin, and all the Brit can do is struggle hopelessly for words, the surf hissing and the _Crest_ groaning beneath us.

"I suppose that ye've never met a pirate, son," the captain says softly in his deep voice, smirking and leaning casually on his gleaming blade.

I cannot breathe; all I can do is stand and shake and hold myself and wait for the moment when I am lost from this world with a single slash of the sword that bites frostily into my aching neck. All eyes sit upon us, the redcoat and I. The sword glitters at my throat. The redcoat's labored breath is sticky against my grimy cheek. The wind whispers and lifts my hair.

The wordless redcoat just blinks and stares and stammers and so I grind my teeth and wrench and lurch myself wildly to the side, grunting and breaking free of the man's faltered hold, his sluggish blade grazing my chest and the burn of the fresh wound throbbing and smarting through my soiled and tattered shirt as my heart thunders like the surf in my temples. His sword flashes silver in my eyes but I cry and draw my pistol and the shot shatters the air like glass, the gasping redcoat collapsing in a blur of crimson and the acrid scent of gunpowder wafting and burning my flared nostrils. And then the combat ensues.

I cannot think anymore. I aim and pull the trigger and slice and slash and kick and punch and stab and parry and dash and scream and fire. My clenched teeth grind into my tongue and my own hot blood burns my lips and I grasp that there is not a man here who cares. Not one who will come to my aid. Not one upon whom I can count on. I throw myself into the fray and cut at the chilling mist with the slashing ice of my blade, my smoky eyes glinting and my lips curled and my teeth grinding painfully together, my heart thudding and my muscles aching and my hair whipping and my sword flying. I've never felt so alive. But I've never felt so dead either. And as I cry and slash and bring my blade down upon all those who cross me, I doubt that I am heard in the first place. The canvas billows above me and the wind carries us away.


	39. Enveloped

_Enveloped_

We had just barely managed to squeeze free of the groping clutches of San Yolanda, the bay swarming with menacing ships that had borne down upon us with their prows grinding through the surf and screaming through the streaming grey fog. Their decks had been swarming with the British, the red of their coats like blood splatters against the fine, polished wood. The wind had whipped and billowed beautifully against the canvas and I had chafed my hands raw from hoisting and securing the sails, my teeth grinding and the sea screaming in my ears and my dirtied scabbard clanging noisily at my side. The clammy touch of the mist-drenched air had swirled chillingly against my skin and yet I found myself clambering like a spider up the rigging and peering stonily out over the dull slate of a sea, my hair whipping and the fog billowing like a cloud about us. For a terrifying second, I'd thought that we'd somehow sailed right off the Edge of the earth and had gone soaring up into the misty reaches of the sky, to be swallowed up by the moon and the sun and the stars. But then the shatter of British gunfire had torn the air and my breath had flooded out in a rush of fresh relief.

We hadn't been able to see a blasted thing through that swirling labyrinth of a haze, that huge mass of thick, sleepy sea-breath that had sat stubbornly over the sharp gray ocean and had refused to budge, veiling the dogged _Crest_ in a billowing cloud of murky grey that had hovered along the slapping waves and swirled about the masts, their pinnacles looming and vanishing into the ominous gloom that brooded sullenly above and about us. A flailing British cannonball would smash the steely sea every now and then, but still the_ Crest _had prowled tenaciously on, the salt breeze whistling in her sails and the waves splashing her along on her dim, bleak course. Tortuga. That is where we sail.

"That stupid boy, that stupid idiot boy; what a fool-I simply cannot believe that ye would; that he would…We had a chance, Smith! We had a chance and then the little whelp went and sent us out to sea! By god, the stupid child is not the bloody captain of this vessel!"

"Aye captain, ah-but please listen, sir! The boy was only looking out for our best interests! Why if it weren't for his yearning to send us out to sea, the bloody Brits would have blasted us down to the Locker, I kid you not!"

"That does not matter. None of that matters. The fool practically acts like he's the captain of this ship, and that kind of behavior I refuse to tolerate! And ye-ye obeyed the dim-witted boy; how could ye dream of doing such a foolhardy thing, now, Smith?"

Smith sputters and there is nothing but creaking, swaying silence. The breeze shivers against me and I stare out and inhale the clean scent of the sea, letting it billow and shimmer and trickle its way down my throat and spill thickly into my thirsty lungs. Somehow, not a man has a word to say.

The captain is not one to be merciful. He streaks his lash across my back in a stream of fire, the words that whip from his lips scarring me just as harshly as the warmth of my running blood that stings and trickles hotly against my skin. I lean and gasp out over the railing as the ship pitches violently, the grey boiling mass of the sea and the fog tilting and whirling nauseatingly about me. He rants and cries and bellows and strikes me over and over again, his words driving themselves deep into my flesh with the cold bite of his lash. Horrible things he says. I know that he aims to shred me, to wound me, to hurt me so that I will not arise again. But I stare out into misty nothingness and his vile words are lost to the howling of the wind, the icy coldness numbing the searing agony that rips relentlessly like steel talons across my torn back. I am left with the lingering scent of my own blood and with the fiery pain of the lash, shivering and staring but feeling nothing, my teeth grinding into my tongue and my eyes narrowed into smoky slits. And later as the painful chords of the captain's guitar twang out across the heavy air, I realize that I haven't heard a single one of the foul words that he had lashed out at me.


	40. The Wild

_The Wild_

Tortuga is a mad place. A place of mirth and riot and obscenities and silk and perfume and filth and love and luminosity and the burning scent of alcohol that lurks around every shadowy corner in the gleaming candlelight. It had been bright and sunny when we'd first pulled up to the docks, the warm wind tickling the back of my neck and clear water splashing like aquamarine and sparkling in the afternoon sun. I'd blinked and brushed my knotted hair from my forehead and suddenly I'd found myself staring dumbly into the flushed face of a terribly giddy-looking woman, her eyes glittering and watering and sliding as she had pranced and giggled and blown wet kisses at me with her mound of hazel hair bouncing lightly in the midday radiance. She'd been wearing naught but a flimsy little silk chiffon that had shone and billowed like a petal in the wind, exposing her blushing pale skin for the entire gawking world to see. It hadn't seemed to bother her in the slightest and the only thing that I could do was stare, groping uselessly for stuttering words that just wouldn't come.

In Tortuga there are fine cobbled pathways and gritty hideaways and glimmering silver and the whimsical light that shines in the eyes of the wenches who stand and swoon on the street corners with the dying sun filtering and throwing itself down upon their brilliant bodies. And then there are the blokes who smell of smoke and beer and skulk about in the shadows, flicking glimmering coins across their nimble palms and eying the street gals with a strange sort passion burning within their flickering, dusky eyes. It had been one of these men who had leapt from the leering darkness and had seized the front of my shirt in his gritty, bruised fists, shouting and screaming some nonsense with his foul breath burning my nostrils and my pounding blood screaming in my ears.

"Aye; the fool had thought ye'd been the one who'd run off with his wife, stupid blighter…" Tanner had chuckled to me as he'd smirked and whirled and pried me away, the street-man cursing and wincing and scuttling back off into the stink and the grime of the alley. "Had a spot too much to drink, the darn buffoon….ah…So pleasant to be in fine old Tortuga again…"

Somehow I'd had naught a word to say.

Every sun-bleached day, Tortuga awakens, sluggish and overdue as the morning sun glares impatiently down. But in spite of this initial lethargy, the town's vibrant fire gleams on long into each and every star-scattered night, laughter pouring sloppily from the town's inebriated breath and spilling out like smoke curling away frivolously into the deep, velvety sky. The town moves like a rhythm of no rhythm, as wild and lighthearted and sparkling with life as the hearty jigs that hustle and twirl and prance within the love-infested saloons and twinkle like scattered diamonds on the blissful, ignorant breeze. Here is the town of the whores and the maids and the stable-boys and the innkeepers and the drunkards and the sneaks and the gamblers and the wandering aristocrats who have nowhere else to go. Here there be dreamers who yearn to capture the sun in their fingers and here there be those who give not a thought as to whether they live or whether they die. Here there are no rules. And this I've come to learn.

Once I'd danced in a smoky tavern with a girl with shimmery rose-lips who'd screeched in mirth and pranced upon the bar-stools and sang and twirled and lifted her ruffled skirt like a flower in bloom. That entire night, she'd never once let go of my left bead-string, leaving me muttering and wincing and hobbling along after her with my head cocked sideways.

Once I'd stumbled into a pair of drunkards who'd lumbered about and sloshed their tankards and followed me every which where I went, laughing and grinning and calling me strange things. It was only after the fat one had called me a 'bouncy little kitty' that I'd bashed them both over the heads with my scabbard and then heaved them with a splat into the foul muck of the street.

Once I'd struck up a conversation with a funny old innkeeper, one with a fizzy mop of grubby hair and only a single eye left to peer through. He'd kept prancing about on his light toes and singing about nothing at all, and whenever I'd dared to interrupt one of his scatterbrained performances, the tankards and his metal tray would clatter and smash onto the floor and he'd whirl and glower upon me like a looming black mass of a thunderhead. I'd learnt not to speak much to him. I feel a bit silly to say it, but his missing eye had made me just the slightest tad uncomfortable. Uncomfortable enough to, say, leap off of my seat like a goldfish every time his mad head had popped up like a daisy over my shoulder.

And so I survive, wandering through the streets and scuffling along the beaches and slinking in the taverns and sitting gawkily upon the bar-stools, tangled in a sweet mess of silk and velvet splashed with the sour taste of alcohol. Sometimes I pretend that it is Morella that I hold warm in my arms, but then my heart plunges and I tell myself not to think of her for nigh another second. When the bar-girls breathe and slump against the tavern wall with their blushing lips parted like the sky, I gather myself up and steal off into the crowd, like a shadow or a wisp of a breeze with my ring glittering in the moonlight and the gold jangling in my drooping pockets. Sometimes I frisk away a glimmering bracelet or a brilliantly jeweled necklace or a gleaming pearl earring, and sometimes I pilfer a flowered silk purse or a silver belt buckle or a funny little handkerchief. Whatever I gather, I stow away inside of my cot, hidden and swathed and buried away where no man's prying eyes can spy. I've no clue as to why I do it, but I feel the cool of the gold on my palms and the twinkle of the gemstones in my eyes and then I am satisfied. Here there _are_ no rules.


	41. Arabella

_Arabella_

She's a tall girl. She stands so tall that her proud chin scrapes the sky and her eyes glitter full of stars that have been unearthed from the very depths of the heavens. She could be a goddess. She could be the sunlight shimmering in a material form, clothed in a frilly, sweeping pearly gown. When I scramble up to gawk beside her, starry-eyed, the top of my head brushes her rosy cheek and I find myself feeling all shrunken and funny and unable to speak comprehensible English. Since when have I gotten to be so small? I gather myself and brush my hair behind my shoulders and prance about on the tips of my boots in order to raise myself up a few centimeters. I laugh and dazzle her with my words and trace my fingers over her shoulder and hope by god's green earth that she doesn't notice my tip-toeing scramble. She doesn't.

_What be your name, miss?_

_Arabella. _

_Arabella who?_

_Just Arabella._

Her laughter blooms like the breath of spring and I cannot help but smile.

Her long golden locks flow like the daylight on the wind and her blushed lips curl like dew-covered rose petals. She smells of love and sugar and candlelight and the jangle of many a doubloon, and so one afternoon I saunter down the avenue and pluck a puckering bloom from the fragrant rose-arbor and present myself as best I can, rocking on my aching toes and warming her with my sunniest grin. I trade in a few stolen coins in order to buy her a fruity little drink and she sips and giggles and twists windblown strands of my hair delicately about her spindly fingers.

"I've seen naught a boy with hair like this….oh, Jack, it's marvelous! Now why do you let it go all mussed like this-this is simply, well, awful, if I can bring myself to say it!"

Arabella giggles and her chestnut eyes glimmer with her drink and I feel yet another little grin wash blissfully over my face.

"Pirate…" I explain, grinning and throwing up arms up uselessly. "It's not like we bother too much about that sort of thing, you know."

My finger gently bops the tip of her nose and she chuckles and playfully grabs hold of my hand, brushing my palm tenderly across her dampened cheek with a smile full of the sun. She's so tall that I find myself craning my head up in order to gaze into her lofty eyes, but this she does not seem to notice….either that or she doesn't mind; hopefully the latter.

I feel the tickle of her breath on my cheek and here it begins, with her rose-petal lips brushing up against mine and the smarting taste of alcohol burning in my mouth. Her groping hands tangle themselves in my hair and I find myself heaved and shoved up gawkily against her, flustered, my chin pressing into her shoulder and her hair scratching my face and my arm twisted about her in a sort of a funny way. My lips part and I yearn to speak, but her sweetness fills me and I cannot bring myself to utter a single word, my breath clogged in my throat and her grace twinkling blindingly before my smoky eyes. The heat flushes my cheeks and I feel the warmth of her fingers as they probe down my back and brush at my thighs and I have to breathe and shift myself in order to shield the dangling black compass from her reaches. It is then that I realize with a jolt that I am perched awkwardly upon the soft silk of Arabella's lap, like a little boy, like a child.

Stammering and my skin sticky and reddened with the embarrassment, I wriggle and attempt to disentangle myself, but then her sugary mouth touches my throat and then suddenly I forget. Who am I? Where am I? From whence do I come? Why am I here? I muse and ponder but I cannot recall and this does not bother me in the slightest. It is only upon leaving the saloon, staggering along drunkenly and star-struck, do I realize that my finger is bare. Arabella has taken the ring.


	42. Words that are Better Left Unspoken

_Words that are Better Left Unspoken _

Tonight is lit in flame, bathed in drink, and dulled with music. But I am not a part of it. I don't think that I can stand it tonight. I sit shakily upon the docks, staring into the moonlight with the silvery whiteness dancing upon the black waves and sparkling upon their breaking crests, hissing and thundering and laced with sea foam. I feel the tickle of my hair against my skin as it is blown about by the salted rush of the sea, and I look down around the glittering surf that crashes about me and I expect in one airborne moment to see that violet ring glimmering on my finger, that ring that was given to me oh so long ago. The ring that I have lost. I scarcely remember the girl's name, that wild girl that had run free in the sea-kissed swamps of …what blasted port was it?... Isla Trinidad, I believe. I struggle and I grope and the sea roars about me and yet I still cannot recall her name. She had a braid like fire that swept her back and eyes like the moon, piercing like daggers into my flesh. I'd barely even known her. I wonder now why I'd even bothered to keep hold of that ring that she had given to me. Maybe it was because I had naught but it to hold onto.

"Oi…Jackie,"

I start, a shot of fear barreling up my spine as I whirl about in surprise, the kiss of the sea-spray lingering on my grimy cheek.

"Why ye be moping out round here at a time like this, lad? Come now, yer only young once."

I instantly recognize the cloud-white hair of Smith and so I set myself back down upon the planks of the pier and cast my gaze back out over the sea, something burning like ice inside of me. In a moment, Smith has seated himself gawkily beside me, smiling and cordially embracing my shoulder, his eyes twinkling with his drink and his chiseled face paled by the silvery shine of the moon.

"What be the trouble, boy?, I can see it in your here eyes; don't hush up, now, old Smithy is here to listen."

But I cannot seem to fetch the words from the back of my throat. Something like ice is blocking my way, and it seems to grow fiercer and colder and it clutches me tighter and tighter within its iron grip. It could be that Smith is intoxicated, when I have never before seen him in such a state. It could be that I have lost my ring to a conniving temptress. It could be that I have lost the pride of the _Pearl _and the affection of Morella, and the more I think of thus, the more the chill envelops me, snaking its tendrils deep into my bosom and deep into the delicate flesh of my throat. I am rendered a fool, and I cannot bring myself to speak. It would be foolish to do so. I have naught much more to lose.

And so I turn away, wrapping my arms round my knees and resting my chin morosely upon them, my eyes heavy with the burn of the sorrow and the weight of my agony. I breathe and finger the black compass and stare out into the shadows, my ears catching the jollity of Tortuga that carries lightheartedly on the warm, balmy breeze. Smith delves his eyes deep into mine and a stream of thick laughter bubbles like syrup from his lips, although I know that it is the rum that laughs so.

"Here, here; speak up, boy!" he chuckles, his head bobbing with his mirth and his eyes glinting drunkenly in the moonlight, his arm snaking round my shoulders as his sour breath tinges my nostrils. "There must be something, now, something that I reckon ye ought to tell me…what may it be, what may it be, funny Jackie boy?"

My shoulders tense and I fear that I cannot stand much more of this. So I suck in a deep breath and grit my teeth and grunt and yank myself sideways, the moon tilting drunkenly as I slip from Smith's grasp and topple over the docks and plunge headfirst into the white pounding of the surf, the salt of the lukewarm waters blurring my eyes and the waves slapping like fingers against my body as the foam shatters and glitters in the moonlight. Breaking the surface, I gasp at the air and thrash in the water that crashes over my head and spills through my fingers and swirls round my legs and washes through my clothes.

On the black of the dock looming above me, peering like a lantern through the flying spray of the surf, stands Smith, his mouth open in awe and his arms shaking like leaves at his sides. His eyes are such a clear, brilliant hue that for a single, wild moment I think that he's somehow been shocked into sobriety, but then he whirls and tilts and retches over the side of the pier, and, sighing, I stroke off solemnly through the waves, the diamond-like foam crashing about me and glimmering in the moon's pale light. I feel the cool, salty slip of the seawater as it washes across my tongue and whips about me like a cool wind, and I stretch my arms out like branches and dig my fingers desperately into the surf, as if swimming hard enough could somehow bring me closer to Morella, closer to the _Pearl_. But for now, all I yearn for is to be rid of Smith and his drunken cries.


	43. Against the Hurt

_Against the Hurt _

I come back to my senses in a sea of blackness and glimmering light and wash upon wash of striking agony, seizing my heart mercilessly in its fiery clutches and racking my trembling body with heaving gasp after heaving breath. The hot scent of my own blood clogs up my nose and I gasp and choke at the air that burns raw in my throat, every movement driving the hurt further and deeper into my shattered bones. They feel as if they have been ground into dust, burned and crushed and then dashed upon the soil and ground a second time. The stars swim and steam drunkenly in my eyes and I find myself spinning sickeningly into the gaping agony of the void; I gasp like a drowning man and drive my soiled fingernails desperately into the flickering substance of the tilting world, fearing that if I were to let go, I would go spinning off of the face of the earth and into the darkest regions of the netherworlds where the pain would lick at my battered limbs and the hungry fire would yearn to consume me, mind and body both. I'm not sure how to think but there is one thing that I know for certain: that I must gather myself together.

My bruised lips draw thirstily at the air and I struggle and force my fluttering eyelids to open, blinking from my eyes the blur of hot tears and the burn of splattered blood and the gulping, encumbering dizziness that threatens to rip me from my senses and cast me back like a baby bird into the upturned sky. The veil of the night settles itself about me and, as to steady myself, my bloodstained fingers sweep themselves against the ground upon which I lie. It is grainy and cold and earthy and it crumbles at my touch, and I manage to pull out of the back of my fractured consciousness the fact that it must be soil that I lie so brokenly upon. The night is damp and shadowy upon me and the sound of my raggedy breath and the roar of my pounding heart thunder like the sea in my ears; somehow, beyond this din, I catch the faint murmur of laughter and the merry beat of music and the slosh of drink. Tortuga. So I have not been plucked from the earth just yet.

For a moment I lie in silence and in awe, with the insects humming in my ears and the sound of the coast and the tavern and the night flickering like candles within me. I breathe and draw quietly at the air when my body is suddenly ripped full of exploding shards of pain, my eyes again drawn painfully shut. For sure my ribs have been crushed under the weight of the sky. For certain my legs have been maimed and wrenched from their sockets. For sure my arms have been pounded into useless pulp. I lie here shivering and trodden and exposed, like driftwood beaten by the sea, like the scattered glass from a busted bottle, like a leaf torn and blown about by the wind. My chest heaves and yet I cannot bring myself to move, cannot force a single word from my throat.

My breath tears at my flesh and a groan escapes my lips and then suddenly I am drowned, drowned in soft blackness, drowned in hot wetness that splatters, stinging, upon my cheek, drowned in silky sugary sweetness and the tender sound of sobbing and the velvet touch of God Himself. But of this I am not worthy. This cannot be. My swampy mind reels helplessly and I fidget and struggle desperately to blink the hurt away, stars pitching into my stomach as I find her eyes swimming like dark pools in the flickering blackness before me. Her waves of smoky hair tumble about me and her graceful fingers lace my shoulder and open my lips fall, the warm air pulled out from every reach of my decrepit body as to breathe the beautiful sound of her name.

Morella, Morella, Morella, I gasp.

Jack, Jack, Jack, she cries, her cheeks shining with her tears.

She gathers up my hand but I am numb to the pain. All I can do is gape, gawk, fill my eyes with her grace, with her tears, with her aroma and with her soothing warmth. I am vaguely aware of her fingers as they sweep like wind across my cheek and shine dark with my own spilled blood, her throat choked with tears as she bends down low over me, like the moon, like an angel.

"God, Jack; what have you _done_ to yourself?; I'd seen you down on the ground and I'd…blessed mother of God, I'd thought that you were dead! Come, speak!"

My lips move but I have not the strength to summon the words. Her hands shake me to and fro and suddenly I am rushed with realization, realization that spills through me and pools like rainwater in my widening eyes. I remember what a fool I have been. I'd caught hold of the wrong girl's heart; the one I'd seen by the tavern window, giggling and sparkling and tossing about her short crop of hazel hair. I remember her lips jammed into mine and the wall like stone at my back and the fiery gaze of her sweetheart as he'd burst his stupid head into our corner, the lummox. I'd been far too stunned to move. I remember his fury and his choking grasp on my neck and then my senses had left me, beaten, bleeding, bruised and tossed about like the water on an angry wave. My mind spins and my fingers clench and yet these words I do not share with Morella, Morella whose tears splatter my skin as she wraps me in her warmth and cradles me like a child in her arms.

"….'S all right…" I manage, my voice no louder than the whisper of the wind. "…All right…"

"Fool…you're not all right, by god. Shut it and lie still; here…"

A cool lip of glass brushes my mouth and my nose is filled with the bitter lick of alcohol.

"Drink."

"Wh…"

"Drink, Jack… blast, just drink it! Here, it'll help."

Her fingers brush my chest and I shudder and grimace with the pain.

Drink, she says, drink.

I retch with the blood and the agony and the tang but I can't help but to yield to the sour kiss of the bottle at my lips, my mouth filled with the burn and my throat scorched with the blaze. My eyes streaming, I struggle with these swigs and then I find my head swimming and billowing about like a cloud, my night-clothed surroundings bending and warping strangely about me, the winkling stars but a jagged blur in my hazed line of sight. My words come thick and forced but I cannot tell what I am saying nor can I make out much of the land that crawls darkly past me. I register that I am moving but I've no clue as to where, and yet I don't feel inclined as to ask anyone. In fact I don't feel much of anything at all.

Where is the air?- is it this kiss that tickles like a rose against my skin?

Where is the sky?- is it this black soup that hovers and drizzles down about me?

Where is the ground?- is it this roughness that floats beneath my dragging legs?

My fingers curl and my eyes swim and I guzzle down at the fire that I hold ever so tightly between my hands, although I've no clue as to what it might be.

Hello, love; I see that you're very much of a beauty; aye you are indeed.

She starts and she whirls about and then she swipes and something light and glassy is torn away from my shaking grasp, my breath flowing like the surf as her dark curtain of hair sweeps fragrantly past my nose, my hands groping and reaching after her for another whiff. But away she melts into the shadow and though I might cry and strain and stretch, her form is something that I cannot seem to reach.

Goodbye, goodbye, love; I do love you all so very much. We will meet again; I'm sure of it….oh and you do smell very much like a flower; rose-like, if I can ever say it…My.

Above me looms a vulture of a man, staring at me down his abnormally massive nose.

Aye, vulture, says I, beaming and feeling very apt.

Stupid lad, stupid lad, says he, shaking an empty bottle very rudely in my face.


	44. The Bottle

_The Bottle _

It shatters to the floor in a sharp rain of green glass that glitters in the sunlight that filters dustily through my flimsily curtained window. I jump and clutch my arm and curse at my own clumsiness and then I wince and shudder at the unexpected wave of pain that barrels itself through my horribly shaken body. Gathering myself, I brush at my knotted hair and then moan and sink dizzily back down upon the hastily thrown-together pile of soiled blankets upon which I have only just awoken, my head throbbing and tilting most sickeningly. My heart thuds noisily in my throat and my breath pains me, my mind reeling with dust and with the biting, sour odor of vomit. I cough and suddenly I realize that I know not where I am, and so I pull myself wearily back onto my feet, stumbling and casting my eyes breathlessly about the room, the ever-so-tiny little room.

From a first glance, I guess that the 'room' is actually more of a closet type thing; each wall looks but a few meters long, and the scuffed wooden floor is cluttered about with musty heaps of assorted junk, ranging from dresses to crooked chairs to yellowed books to ripped pillows to rusted, funny looking lamps. My lungs fill with the dust-laden air and the particulates dance in the light that spills thickly through the lacy curtain-fabric, the curtains that I throw hastily aside as I clamber over to the window and thrust it desperately open. Retching slightly, I stare down blankly at the sun-bathed streets of Tortuga and suddenly I remember all that befell on that last night of my recollection, my body aching with all of my various hurts and wounds, all of which have been carefully bound (as I have only just noticed) with the same faded, frilly pale fabric that flutters from the window-pane.

I blink and wheel about awkwardly, for my head still spins, and upon scanning the room a second time, my muddled eyes catch hold of a single sheet of crisp parchment, upon which there is my name and a message written in a neat, flourished hand:

_Dearest Jack, _

_It is my bedroom closet in which you find yourself; I am deeply sorry for the confusion-I daresay that my irksome doorman spotted you when I attempted to steal you into my home (you were gravely injured; I pray that you remember), and I cannot take a chance that my mum and dad might discover of us. As for an explanation of your current situation, I will briefly write that (last night) I offered you a whiskey as to ease your pain, and the next time I'd spared a look, I'd discovered that you had drained the entire bottle (even quicker than a drunkard-was it indeed your first drink?) . Thus, you've most likely fallen a bit ill. I am sorry and I do hope you forgive me; if you are indeed reading this message, I will return shortly with a bite for you to eat. (stay put-you hear?)_

_Truly yours,_

_Morella __(do get well soon!) _

I blink, my stomach knotting and my eyes flickering over the shards of bottle that lie twinkling upon the floor. The bottle of which I had drunken all in a matter of minutes. Despite the throb in my ribs, I find my mouth running with laughter as I clamber down through the windowsill and slide to the dust of street, teetering and wobbling and vomiting upon the roadside. For some reason it all seems very amusing indeed.


	45. An Encroachment

_An Encroachment _

_"I once knew of a man called by such a name that we all took a laugh at him ev'ry time he took to waltzing by: his name was Killy Beechoo, I kid ye not! I s'pose that the gent was born in some funny far-away country or else his mum would've never bestowed him with such a name; it caused him a great deal of shame when the poor fellow turned pirate." _

The barman is a funny man, an old crotchety bloke by the name of Samuel Heathens, a man so beaten by the sea that he's left with naught but a single arm and no legs. He's taken to hobbling about on splintered wooden pegs, false-legs that scratch and creak as he carries round his iron tray, grumbling and bumbling and muttering out little scratchy words that rouse even the most stoic of men. Old Sam has naught a cent to his name and yet somehow he's come into possession of this lively Tortuga tavern-a place of shadow and wood and stone and fire and keg upon keg of drink.

_"Aye; ye fools know that once I took down a junk, all by my own hand? Oh aye, I did; I shot at the bloody thing and I hit the gunpowder in the hold and-ah-there she went! All in smoke and fire and screams.. I've never done something so great as that, right there." _

Sometimes I pay old Sam a shilling. Sometimes I pay him a doubloon. And sometimes I pay him a stolen bracelet, a graceful band of metal that glitters in the dancing, smoky light. All of these the weathered barman accepts with a gleam of his golden-plated teeth and a wave of his earth-caked hand, ushering me to take my drink and take a seat. He notes not my age. He notes not the fact that once I pressed a lady's wedding ring into his palm, as to pay for the late night's rum. He seems not to care about much of anything -he'll happily take hold of the silver or the gold and lurk like a sun in the corner, not to bother again. And so I sit klutzily in the flickering fire-light upon the rum-soaked bar stool and sip at my drink, the fire like life in my veins and the voices bustling and blossoming like smoke in the shifting darkness about me. My eyes blur and my head bubbles and the men chatter on about all sorts, every bloody thing that a man could dare to dream up.

"_Have ye heard of the jeweler's little daughter?; the pretty little one that fawns round the garden at night? Turns out that the wench was taken by the sea but a fortnight ago…poor lass…"_

"_Ah, and that's when the fool cried, 'And aye; I'll kill ye all!' We loaded the cannon and lit the powder and he blew clear over the rail and into the waves; never saw that lummox again, I'd say that he got what was coming to him."_

"_Don't order that one, idiot!: even a donkey knows that this here ale is the finest thing round these parts…"_

"Aye; they be comin' all righ'-we's all heard it an' I'd seen it with my own two eyes…..the Brits. They're bloody evry'where; it's like a blasted stain, leakin' all over the ocean. I reckon that there be no way to stop the bloody menace."

It is old Sam, ringing out his harsh words again, glaring and scuttling and casting them out into cold without a second nasty thought. The silence hangs like a hovering breath and all men just sit and stare, their wide eyes fixed like gemstones upon the shuffling barman as he grimaces and growls and scrubs away at a pewter tankard and mutters dourly to his worn, lonely self. And when the din resumes, I find myself wide-eyed upon my stool, sitting like a stone and clutching my drink blankly in my hands, my mind lost upon something that seems so utterly far-away.


	46. Discoveries

_Discoveries _

I don't know why I sit here today, perching like a gull on the stubborn bowsprit of the _Crest_ with the air like wings in my hair and the water sparkling and rushing about in flying scatters of glassy crystals, like a breath, like a song. The world whispers a million whispers and none of them I can hear, for my head is stuffed full with the fine whiskey from the captain's stores. I lean with my shoulders over the sea, my head in the sky, and my eyes glittering full of the sunbeams and the alcohol, the world bobbing me up and down and my legs dangling freely out over the water, the sun-drenched wood warm against my skin.

The _Crest_ sits frighteningly silent, for her decks are airy and lonely and empty without the usual tainted din of the crew. Every man now wanders drunkenly about the bowels of Tortuga, each with his drink pounding in his head and his mouth choked full with stupid laughter. Even my mum now sings and flows in the tavern shadows, and with a pang I realize that it has been many a fortnight since I've looked her in the eyes. There is a thing that I wish to ask her but the whiskey muddles my brains and I cannot seem to scrape the question free. The sun dazzles off of the ocean and I squint and stare out, blinking. The question must ache something terrible. It's better that I don't know.

Many things I don't know, in fact. I don't know what has happened to Smith; he seems to have disappeared, and I haven't caught a glimpse of him in nigh a month. I don't know how the captain fares, and at this I grimace and wash my mouth with another drink. I don't know how where the _Crest_ is doomed to sail next, and I know not even how many years sit heavily upon my shoulders.

I struggle to recall and my leg slips a bit on the bowsprit, my heart lurching at the prospect of tumbling like a falling stone into the laughing waters of the sunlit bay. Cursing and muttering, I scramble and breathe and right myself, the sea-breeze stroking my throat and my windblown hair whipping the air in rough, dark tangles. I grip the wood with my callused fingers and then I feel the cool slide of the whiskey bottle as it slips like rain from underneath my palm, the sunlight catching a bright flash of the glass before it dips into the salty cradle of the glossy, lapping surf. The captain's fine whiskey. I blink and stare as the bottle glimmers and bobbles in the waves, my mind unable to grasp what to think. I pitch and I breathe and I run my tongue thirstily over my cracked lips. How very lost I am.

My breath is suddenly shattered and seized by the whitest of fingers, shining, marble-like things that splash through the web of the water and clutch the glittering glass of the nodding whiskey bottle, squeezing it as a sunny, gleaming head rises from the waves. She giggles and she smiles and turns her eyes on me, her eyes so brilliant that they draw from me every drop of my forlorn breath. In her laughing eyes glimmers every flying drop of glittering sea-spray, the golden glow of every sunken doubloon, every shifting beam of sunlight that filters and rains down into the sea. I cannot say what color it is; there is no color beautiful enough. The lass cocks her head and laughs at me, my body frozen and the water swirling delicately about her shoulders, the whiskey bottle still clutched in her hand.

"Is this yours, my fine friend?" she says in her seashell-bright voice.

She shakes the bottle at me and I search myself for the words, my finger proclaiming the things that I seem to have lost.

"Of course it is; I know guilty when I see it."

She throws up at me another smile that sweeps away the words that I struggle to bring to my parched lips.

"You know, I don't like very much when you boys toss your rubbish into my ocean," she scolds playfully, her jokes glowing upon her smiling lips and her sentences flowing like the tide.

"I didn't."

I can hardly believe that I've managed to speak. The girl peers up at me, unconvinced, the sunlight gleaming in her misty, silvery hair.

"…_you didn't_ what?" she asks, smiling again so breathtakingly that I nearly lose the feeble grip on my words.

"Didn't throw that bottle into the water. The silly thing… slipped. Aye. Yes."

The girl's pearly fingers stroke the surf and she beams like radiance itself, her skin emitting a glow like the moon on the midnight sea. I shake my head and blink the whiskey from my eyes; the girl floats like a lily and her bubbling laughter shines like a chime in the wind.

"What's your name, funny boy?"

I sit for a minute and then it comes to me, my mind clutching it and desperately pitching it from my lips.

"Jack…" I gulp. "I'm Jack."

"Jack," she repeats dreamily, the stars spreading in her eyes. Upon her lips my name sounds like lace, like the wind, like the grace of the whisper of the sea. So beautiful. "And how many years have you, Jack?"

How old am I. I open my mouth to reply but I am struck dumb, for this is one question that I cannot answer.

"You don't know," the girl breathes, as if she has read my brain. "You are a man of the sea, are you not?"

My head bobbles up and down even though I haven't a blasted clue as to what she has just asked me. I wrack my brains to ask her but suddenly something intangible is lifted from me; feeling naked, I peer down at the girl in the water and I find that her eyes are closed, her mind casted away to sink down into the heart of the ocean, into the heart that pounds like the surf within my chest.

"Sixteen. You have seen sixteen years, sixteen sea-tainted years, little Jack."

"Who are you? Wh….what _are_ you?"

"You do not believe me."

"No."

"The sea does not lie. And neither does the mirror-she will tell you herself."

The girl speaks so strangely that she leaves me in a wordless, breathless mess, her eyes full of stars and the bottle shimmering into dust in her hand. She smiles and the sea gracefully swallows her into its labyrinth of blue, a flash gleaming into my eyes with the rumbling roar of the ocean. Gone. She's gone as if she'd never come. Gone like the flying time that has somehow totaled sixteen years. How long has the _Crest _dawdled in Tortuga's blinding comfort? How long have I laid in Morella's arms and drowned my lungs with rum and run round the saloon shadows with many a salty wench? How many stolen treasures have accumulated under my musty cot-pillow? I stare into the sea, searching for answers, but I find nothing but the foam of the surf and the gloss of the waves as they glimmer in the sun and lap quietly against the hull of the _Crest_.

And so I scour the captain's den, poring through the dusty volumes that sit so anciently upon the shelves, glowering down upon me like a conglomeration of angry stones. I rip and tear through the pages and bat at the dust when I glance over a drawing and suddenly it dawns upon me: it was apparently a mermaid whom had risen from the ocean to speak and to fawn over me. A mermaid. Certainly the whiskey has muddled my brain so funny so that I see things that do not exist.

Shaking my head, I shove the volume away and pull out another one, thrusting it open and thirstily sticking my nose into it. Latin. Another is French. Yet another is on navigation. So many books the captain has; I drag them from the drunken shelves and fill my eyes with their pages, disbelieving the fact that I had not noticed them before. My dirty hands seem funnily unworthy against the grandeur of these finely scripted words. I sit and flip the pages, entranced until I open one cover to the flash of a water-stained mirror; then I let out a yelp and the book thuds to the floor, for I am frightened at the prospect of that stubbly, scruffy face as being my own.


	47. What if

_What if_

The earth is topsy-turvy, seized and turned about and shaken on its head.

The sun is a blister, blazing heatedly as it glowers silently above, a prick that clings to the sky's arms like a drop of fire. I stumble and drink and throw my gaze about as its angry light shatters in my dazzled eyes, pounding down upon the city and glinting ever so sharply off the waves. It prickles and burns on the back of my neck and I find myself scuttling away into the cool of the shadows, feeling stupid and flighty and exposed.

The sky too seems sullen, bluer than blue and opening up nauseatingly into cavernous mouths of gaping, yawning void, so empty and so vast that it sends me wobbling like a baby bird upon the soil, the weight of the heavens crashing down on my head. My feet scrape the earth and my eyes fix themselves doggedly above, as to not lose my balance and find myself tripping up into the belly of the sky, my cries swept into nothingness and my arms and legs floundering sickeningly about.

It don't work that way, grumbles old Sam's gravely whiskey words, his eyes crawling down upon the grungy tavern floor as he speaks.

Ye can't fall _up_, ye dim-witted dingbat.

But what if I can? What if I did?

Have some more rum, lad.

The cool of the tankard sloshes into my palm and I desperately wash my throat with its soothing burn, the ground leaning drunkenly under my toes and the hearty oil- lights slithering faintly before my eyes. I laugh.

That ink-blotted night, as the alcohol drags my knees down, sagging and scraping awkwardly onto the rough stone of the floor, the bite of vomit pricks the back of my throat and I spill my meager supper down in rivers of sickening, sour waves, waves that scorch my nostrils and sting my eyes and send the lasses skittering away like frightened spiders. The shadows snickering and the hearth spitting, I turn and sway and pull myself out giddily through the side-door, my burned lungs gasping at the cool night air and my fingers grasping the door-frame as if it was the only thing that was bothering to keep me alive.

The stars swim above me, my jaw hanging and my eyes filling full of them. So beautiful. My fingers grope at the empty blackness and I feel as if I could scoop up a glittering handful of the lot, laughing and dancing and holding them up high above my head, the facets gleaming and trickling through my fingers like crystal rain, catching the light and laughing right along with me. What if I could? I'd be the richest man alive is what I'd be. A smile tugs at my lips and the sky looms and swallows me without a care in the world. When I again I resurface, I laugh.

What if this is all a dream?

What if indeed I'm just sleeping and waiting for some fool to prod me awake, just to blink open my eyes and find them stuck full of splinters of daylight?

What if nothing is real?

Where would I be? What if I open my eyes and find them floating in some strange place that been dragged to hell and back, darling? What would I do, love, what would I do?

I don't pretend to know, Jackie. I only hope that I'd be there with you. I hope that I'm not a dream, Jackie.

Morella's eyes are blazing, blazing full of that prickled starlight and warm with the lick of kindled flame, the kind that blooms into searing tongues instead of smoking lazily about. The cascades of her hair are the folds of the night that wrap themselves warm around me, trickling heaven spilling from those petals of her lips, sweet like dew swirling gently upon my thirsty tongue. This for sure must be a dream. Something sharp seizes my throat and I choke on my own self, fearing the moment in which I might awake. My breath is struggling and sour with whiskey but her fingers drift like clouds and I can't help but to forget. In the back of my mind, the sailing redcoats stain like blood on the waves and still I forget.

My eyes slip closed and I am lost.

This is a dream from which I refuse to be awakened.


	48. Greensleeves

_Greensleeves_

_**Alas, my love, you do me wrong,  
To cast me off discourteously.  
For I have loved you well and long,  
Delighting in your company.**_

Tonight the tavern musician men sing of nothing. Nothing, I think, this whole blasted thing is nothing. A dream. Nothing. I perch upon my barstool and stare, for naught much else I find that I can do.

_**Greensleeves was all my joy  
Greensleeves was my delight,  
Greensleeves was my heart of gold,  
And who but my lady greensleeves.**_

The stupid voices of the fiddle-men lift the air and still they reach my ears, their words stinging and prickling like irate little bugs. Oh, I wish that they'd just shut it. My teeth grind and I turn my head away, my fingers hard upon my tankard, the tankard that I haven't the money to pay for.

___**Your vows you've broken, like my heart,  
Oh, why did you so enrapture me?  
Now I remain in a world apart  
But my heart remains in captivity.**_

Oh bugger, there they go again, singing away like silly little boys. Don't they know what I have lost today? Her. She. She who I cannot grab and drag back to my side, where she used to shine like a moon through the fog. And all they can do is jig and laugh with their little fiddles jeering their ugly little bows at me.

_**Greensleeves was all my joy  
Greensleeves was my delight,  
Greensleeves was my heart of gold,  
And who but my lady greensleeves**__._

Desperate tears blur my eyes and I blink and blink and blink them away, stabbing the air with my tankard and throwing the burning fire down my throat. My heart cries at my chest and I wish for all the hope in the world that I will sit and drown in my own misery, drown in this sour liquid that I flush myself with.__

_**I have been ready at your hand,  
To grant whatever you would crave,  
I have both wagered life and land,  
Your love and good-will for to have.**_

I slam down my tankard and my heart screams again, so loudly and painfully that I grimace and think of telling it to 'shut it' as well. Shut it! Shut it shut it shut it! My heart nearly listens, but of course the musicians do no such thing._****_

Greensleeves was all my joy  
Greensleeves was my delight,  
Greensleeves was my heart of gold,  
And who but my lady greensleeves.

Yes, I know that I have loved her, yes, and so you've told me. Must you sing this chorus over and over again so many bloody times? _****_

If you intend thus to disdain,  
It does the more enrapture me,  
And even so, I still remain  
A lover in captivity.

So I am in captivity. In captivity I remain. Once I was free. Free and dizzy and sick, stumbling around like a stupid little boy. Too much rum to mist my eyes. There had been a girl there at the bar. One with green eyes. Eyes like emeralds. Eyes that had twinkled in the flickering light and lips that had smiled and yearned for me to approach. And so I had done so._****_

Greensleeves was all my joy  
Greensleeves was my delight,  
Greensleeves was my heart of gold,  
And who but my lady greensleeves.

The girl with the emerald eyes had not let go. Not once I'd sat and laughed and chatted beside her. Not when I had struggled to reach for another drink, not when I'd heaved and choked on my supper, not when the barman had come bumbling over with his tray and had stumbled over us and fell. We had been a rowdy tangle of arms and legs and alcohol and snarled hair. My back had slammed down hard upon the floor and my breath had shuddered and left me. Still she had not let go. But I hadn't so much wanted to leave. _****_

My men were clothed all in green,  
And they did ever wait on thee;  
All this was gallant to be seen,  
And yet thou wouldst not love me.

And then she had come. Morella. Swathed in white and lace and cloud, with her eyes beautiful like dark pools. She'd brushed her skirts and peered down upon us and when her eyes had finally found mine, hers had been strewn with tears. Tears like the rain and the sweet sea spray. Tears that had glittered like streaming diamonds as she'd whirled and dashed away. She hadn't come back, no matter how much I'd called.

_****_

Greensleeves was all my joy  
Greensleeves was my delight,  
Greensleeves was my heart of gold,  
And who but my lady greensleeves.

_****_"Oh, Morella! Morella Morella Morella! Come back; I didn't mean it!"

It had been a bit hard to say this with the emerald eyed girl strung round my neck, so I'd whipped out my blade to ward her off, dashing out after the retreating flow of Morella's smoky hair, the sword gleaming like light in my hand and the words tumbling like water from my lips. _****_

Thou couldst desire no earthly thing,  
but still thou hadst it readily.  
Thy music still to play and sing;  
And yet thou wouldst not love me.

_****_I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry. It was a mistake; an accident. I had tried my best, Morella-I had even whipped out my blade and casted away that fiend of a girl, that wench with the emerald eyes. Never did I love her, never.

_**Greensleeves was all my joy  
Greensleeves was my delight,  
Greensleeves was my heart of gold,  
And who but my lady greensleeves.**_

_****_There had been too much drink. Too much drink and too many shadows and not enough light. My brain had been so frazzled that I could not think straight. It had never been a joke, Morella; it had never been some game, only to be played for my own laughter. I loved you, Morella, I loved you. And still I do.

_**Well, I will pray to God on high,  
that thou my constancy mayst see,  
And that yet once before I die,  
Thou wilt vouchsafe to love me.**_

My eyes streaming with invisible tears I could not bear to release, I had staggered out after her like a blind man into the smoke of the outside patio, only to find myself stuck with the daggers of Morella's sharp gaze. The golden lamplight on her hair. The curtain of the night on her skin. The sea's kiss in her eyes. Angry words trembling unspoken on her lips. The silver ring, the one I had stolen for her, glimmering on her finger. _****_

Greensleeves was all my joy  
Greensleeves was my delight,  
Greensleeves was my heart of gold,  
And who but my lady greensleeves.

_****_Yes, music-men-I had told her just so. I love you Morella, I love you; really I do. My feet had staggered under me and my breath had smelled sour of liquor, my eyes misted over and distant. She had retreated into the swollen night, ever so slowly, the darkness creeping over her, inch by measly little inch. The lamplight had burned in her gaze, as cold as a stone, as unforgiving as the bitter steel of a blade. _****_

Ah, Greensleeves, now farewell, adieu,  
To God I pray to prosper thee,  
For I am still thy lover true,  
Come once again and love me.

Her lips had been hard, as rigid and silent as stone, the tears shining bright against the white marble of her face. My dizzy words had struggled in that frosty silence, and as her lips had finally parted, I had felt myself filled with the warmth of the words that she would surely say. And yet all I had received was the stinging whip of her palm, a blow like a flame against my tender cheek. A slap and she had gone. Swallowed by the night. Leaving me staring helplessly into its face, empty as the open ocean. Somehow I had known that she would never bother to return._****_

Greensleeves was all my joy  
Greensleeves was my delight,  
Greensleeves was my heart of gold,  
And who but my lady greensleeves.  



	49. Glass and Silver

_Glass and Silver_

"Some lummox has left it on the deck, that's all…s' nothing at all, really. Aye. Nothing. Yes."

I can't help it; against my will, as if they are drawn by a magnetic pull, my eyes slide back over the bottle, the bottle that's sticking out like a sore thumb on the deck of the _Crest_, its pristine glass shimmering like rainwater in the bright, giddy Tortuga sun.

"Bugger!" I snap, throwing my gaze out over the harbor again, struggling to lock my attention on the glittering of the clear, tropical waters that hush and whisper as they break against the sun-drenched shoreline. But the water doesn't prove intriguing enough, and I find my eyes wandering back to stare upon that one lone bottle, that bottle that had certainly not been left there by a drunken, bumbling crewman. Certainly not. If that's a rum bottle, than I'm a jellyfish. Yes, a jellyfish. If I were a jellyfish, then maybe I could shock my brain into sanity with a rush of poisonous venom; aye, that would about do it. Ever since I'd woken up slathered in the muck and slime of the pigpen out behind the bar, a ferocious oinker curled up happily on my stomach, my mind has seemed to fail me. I'm just a boy with a gaping hole slashed out of the pit of his stomach, a hole that I've drowned instead of filling. Filling it seems as impossible as catching the moon out of sky like a gleaming fish in a net. Fixing it like a gem on a crown, balancing it cockily on your skull and marching around, the sound of laughter glittering and bubbling from your lips like a fountain of the most beautiful things.

I'm standing with my arms hanging like a simian's when my glassy eyes catch a quick gleam of silver from deep within the mysterious bottle's fragile shell; a very suspicious gleam. Like a wink. A wink from a long forgotten friend. My self control slipping away like raindrops from the skin, my fingers fly out and snatch up the bottle (all on their own). The glass is like smooth water under my fingertips, water warmed by the soft touch of the sun. Staring at me from within its transparent cocoon is a small band of silver, a ring sparkling in the watery sunshine that filters in through the walls of the bottle. It is the ring that had once crowned the finger of my love, whose name sticks like alcohol in my burning throat. In my mind's eye she strips her hand unthinkably naked of my stolen gift, her eyes stained with filth as she casts away the silver ring as if it was the most revolting thing ever seen, the tiny glint of silver soaring unwanted, only to be lodged in the dead earth and buried in the ground's bosom, never be seen again. This terrible thought crushes my lungs in its icy fist, leaving me shaking and unable to draw breath. A fish out of water.

A crash and suddenly my hand is clutching only empty air, the bottle's glittering glass innards shattering like ice across the deck, the ring glinting sadly amidst the biting grains of windswept dust. The ring that is suddenly clutched in my hand again, icy and foreign in my palm, and then it is sailing out over the water, a shooting glint of silver lost against the yawning blue of the sea and sky. _Plink_, and the ring is gone. Swallowed by the tide. Silver drowned in blue. Embedded in the sand and silt of the ocean bottom, nibbled by the fish and glittering in the passing beams of crystalline light that play down through the waves and dance and drift upon the sand. It's a moment before I realize that I'm watching the things that I cannot see. My feet drag against the wood and silently I'm walking away, because I can think of nothing better to do.


End file.
